Alonso says there is time to recover

The Spaniard is enduring a disappointing season so far and is already 92 points behind championship leader Sebastian Vettel.

Alonso would need three race wins and a second, with four retirements from Vettel to overtake the German.

The Ferrari driver says it is a must for Ferrari to have the quickest car of the field if he is to recover, the two-time champion claiming he has driven the best seven races of his career this year.

"We need to have the best car," said Alonso. "If we have the best car we can win the title, there is plenty of time, plenty of races to recover. We need to try and win every race we go. Sometimes it is impossible, but that is our aim.

"We need to respect our opponents and we need to understand that some races and some places we cannot do that. This is also some pressure that you have when you are Ferrari - you need to win every race you go to, you need to win every championship you go to.

"These seven races, I drove the best seven races of my career, the best qualifying laps and the best starts."

Alonso also reckons the changes to the rules introduced this weekend, with teams not allowed to change engine maps between qualifying and the race, will not make a significant difference.

"I don't know. Hopefully, but I don't think it will change massively the qualifying order," he said. "I think Sebastian was the quickest in qualifying, it is true it was not one second but two tenths, but he was quickest in the wet, we were following him and he was eight/nine tenths quicker in the race.

"In the races you seem a little bit closer but we are not desperate to go here and win the race. We need to know where we are at the moment, we know we need to keep working in the direction we took. It seems we are more competitive but we cannot underestimate or forget how quick our opponents are."

He is happy about Ferrari's progress in the last two races, however, and he feels he could be competitive again this weekend in Valencia.

"At the moment it is difficult to win a race, there is no doubt that in Monaco and Canada we had the opportunity to win, that is fact, that is not a dream. We were very close, we were on the front row of the grid in Canada and we were 10 cm from winning in Monaco.

"The trend is quite good, we are improving. The Valencia characteristics are similar to Montreal and Monaco, but we have to remember we are one second behind sometimes in qualifying."