"There's nothing that explains it." Spa cruelly slaps Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz.

If Spain's Formula 1 presence had to be judged globally on a Saturday at a 2025 Grand Prix, the Spa event could possibly be declared the worst of the year, both in terms of starting positions and the dynamics of qualifying for Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz. It could be described as a complete disaster, to be more precise.

Fifteenth, the Madrid native was on a magnificent path until, unexpectedly and incomprehensibly, he crashed into an invisible wall , while Alonso added with Aston Martin - last row for both drivers - the worst result since the team arrived in Formula 1. In the case of the British team, neither a success with the set-up, nor aerodynamic efficiency on a circuit that rewards it, nor anything at all.

The Belgian Grand Prix looks tough for the Spanish drivers. The expected rain may open a window of opportunity for both, although all their rivals are hoping and saying the same thing. A 'Hulkenberg' for Sunday? Not in my wildest dreams. "I don't know, not me. It's never happened to me in twenty years of racing, so, eh, maybe he (Hulkenberg) visited Lourdes before Silverstone..."

An invisible barrier

Sainz started Saturday with the taste of the auspicious Ides. Sixth on the grid in the sprint , he held his position comfortably at the finish line. In Q1, it was more of the same. Starting second on his first attempt, he finished eighth, comfortably in the first block. And suddenly, the weekend's trend was broken without the slightest warning.

In Q2, Sainz achieved a first time more than a second off the lead, on used tires . This was a remedial effort on fresh tires, with Albon already in Q3 as a benchmark with his final lap still to go. Against all odds, the Madrid native crashed into an invisible barrier and couldn't improve his second time either, effectively truncating the positive pattern he'd been on up to that point. Curiously, with the way the track developed , he couldn't even improve his Q1 time . In fact, it actually backfired.

Even more painful, if possible, was Sainz's result when Albon started the Belgian track with a superb time that placed him fifth. More or less in the same zone as Sainz on the sprint grid. Now it was the Madrid native who was scratching his head, bewildered. "We still have to understand it," he said, perplexed, at the end of the session. "The tire working window is very narrow, and we did a good job finding the optimal point to bring it all together," explained Albon after his magnificent session. Carlos Sainz couldn't enter that window because he couldn't find the sweet spot on the soft tire .

"In Q2, for some reason, I wasn't able to go faster; I didn't feel as much grip as I did in Q1," confirmed the Madrid native. The track had warmed up. Sainz acknowledged that Albon had a different set-up than him. The Thai driver, with more experience with the new tire on one lap, was better able to handle the evolution of the track and the setup than the Spaniard? "There's nothing that explains, given how strong I've been all weekend, why we didn't improve in Q2 and didn't make it to Q3." It'll be time to work hard analyzing the data with the team.

In the race, Williams was optimistic about the FW45's pace. As confirmed in 2024, overtaking is extremely difficult in dry conditions and under DRS conditions. Only the expected, though unpredictable, rain offered any hope for the Madrid-born driver. The stone to the forehead was painful, though, due to its unexpected nature.

The AMR25 is incomprehensible.

19 and 20 Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll. Objectively, the last team at Spa. We'd have to go back to 2022 for a similar result , but not as bad. Neither the experiments nor the fine-tuning of the elements introduced at Spa were successful, nor was there any top speed or power for the second sector of the Belgian track. Nor was there a setup designed for rain.

Different front wings, one specific for Spa. Nose, rear wing, beam wing , Imola floor... Aston Martin brought various elements to complete its " 2025 package" and treated the Belgian Grand Prix as a testing and experimentation session - as Alonso had veiledly hinted on Thursday - but it backfired. No possible combination of set-up with the new elements worked.

To top it all off, this proved to be a killer track for the AMR25. "We never have a clear idea of which circuits are going to be the best and worst, but the truth is that it was bad. From the first session on, we haven't found any rhythm," Alonso explained at the end. "So, the characteristics of the circuit, the setup decisions, or whatever, we haven't found the rhythm, and we have to understand that, we have to accept that, we weren't fast enough."

Alonso also denied that such a result was the result of playing the rainy-day setup card. "We made some wing changes thinking about tomorrow's rain. But in these cases, I prefer to start in the top five with the dry setup than last with the rain setup, since you can't overtake anyone. It would mean going about a tenth slower than our optimum, and we're half a second away from making it to Q2." Stark. And the final proof that the AMR25 was a real pain at Spa . "I didn't experience any major difficulties while driving or any scares that the car gave me. Everything went more or less well..."

The Asturian didn't even consider the opportunity that rain could provide. " In a dry race. Starting last and second to last, we're going to finish more or less in that position. If it rains, anything can happen. Hopefully we'll be lucky, this time with a slightly risky strategy that pays off. But hey, starting from the back, visibility is also very low. So it's a complicated weekend in which it seems impossible to score points, and what we're going to do is learn and arrive in Hungary in better shape."