Alonso: Race finish is the priority

The Spanish driver qualified in third position behind the two Red Bull drivers, and although he concedes his chances for the race are looking good, Alonso said it is vital not to fail to score.

Alonso is 14 points behind Mark Webber with three races remaining.

The Ferrari driver, who was pleased with his qualifying effort, said the possibility of rain on Sunday was still a big question mark.

"We need to see the forecast," he said. "There are still some doubts about the rain possibility, especially in the morning.

"We need to be calm and finish the race. Maybe tomorrow all five finish the race. We cannot be one of those who does not finish. We need to keep scoring points in every race, and I am sure with that we will be very happy with that."

He added: "I think for us it was a nice qualifying, a nice smooth qualifying. We were a little bit quicker and found some pace with the Primes. The car was again very, very quick.

"And again, once more it is our maximum potential today, which in a way is very good new because qualifying is not our strongest point of the weekend and here it looks close to RBR, so it looks good for tomorrow."

Alonso reckons overtaking the Red Bull duo remains a possibility given the nature of the circuit.

"We have to see," he said. "There are some circuits where you see some good overtaking points, and you see races where it can be difficult or there is no overtaking at all.

"Then there are some circuits where you see no real possibilities, like Suzuka 2005/2006 or the last race like Kobayashi. There are two or three opportunities for overtaking here."