Alonso: Ferrari needs perfect weekend

Fernando Alonso says he is hoping for a perfect German Grand Prix weekend to bounce back from the disappointment of the previous two races

"The target is to finally have a perfect weekend," said Alonso, who has scored just four points in Valencia and Silverstone, after practice.

"We have done some good Fridays before, but we need to do a perfect Saturday and a perfect Sunday.

"If it is behind the Red Bull and we are not quick enough to challenge them then okay, but if we can be in front of them then even better," added the Spaniard, who finished on top of the times in Friday's second practice session.

Despite his quickest time, and despite Red Bull rivals saying Ferrari is looking very strong, Alonso downplayed his performance.

"Friday is not very representative of the times, and perhaps this Friday was even more strange because of the track conditions, which changed constantly," he told Spanish reporters.

"But we tested everything we wanted to test. Now we have to analyse all the data we have, but it was a positive Friday.

"But we won't know how competitive we are until tomorrow and the grid will not have changed radically from Silverstone to here and so McLaren, Red Bull and us will be up there."

Alonso is currently 47 points behind championship leader Lewis Hamilton, and the Spaniard says the main goal right now is to finish ahead of the Briton.

"You have to try to finish ahead of the leader so the gap doesn't increase," he said. "Right now it's a McLaren so we have to try to finish ahead of them to be less than 47 points away in the next race.

"If in the next race it's a Red Bull, then we'll have to try to finish ahead of that Red Bull and so on.

"Especially we need to have a better second half of the season, with more podiums."