Alonso Expecting Tough Weekend for Renault

Spanish driver Fernando Alonso is expecting his Renault team to endure a tough weekend at the San Marino Grand Prix.

Both Alonso and teammate Jarno Trulli failed to shine in today's qualifying session, with the Spaniard finishing in 13th position while the Italian was down in 16th. The French outfit are currently in second position in the Constructors' Championship and Alonso has scored two consecutive third places.

21-year old Alonso, however, has played down his team's chances at Imola.

"As we expected, it's going to be a hard weekend for us, as we are struggling with tyres on this very fast circuit," said Alonso. "But we still a have a full-day's work and I am optimistic we can reasonably improve our final position on the grid in tomorrow's qualifying."

Renault, one of four teams who tested in this morning's test session, were unable to take full advantage of the two hours of work due to some problems with their cars. Despite that, Trulli said he was optimistic on moving forward tomorrow.

"This morning we lost time during the test and free sessions, with few problems on the car and therefore this afternoon, I felt the car was not well balanced , which reflected in my poor lap time," said Trulli.

"We will have to set to work hard on the car now, but am confident I can improve my position tomorrow."