Fernando Alonso has ended up in hospital as the result of a bike accident during routine pre-season training in Switzerland. According to reports Alonso was hit by a car on a suburban route of Lugano. As news of Alonso’s hospitalization emerged Alpine F1, for whom Alonso is driving for in 2021, released a strange press release regarding their star driver’s condition:
‘Fernando himself is conscious and well in himself and is awaiting further medical examinations tomorrow morning [Friday].’
Clearly, Alonso was badly injured and quite possibly knocked unconscious by the collision. Otherwise, Alpine F1 would not have robotically stated that he “conscious and well in himself”. And now snippets of information are surfacing revealing that Alonso may have suffered multiple fractures.
If the accident was a minor collision we would have seen Alonso posting a message on his Twitter account from his hospital bed. Alonso needs to recover quickly, pre-season testing is scheduled for March 12-14 in Bahrain, the first race is to held on March 26-28. A bone fracture can take up to 4-8 weeks to fully heal.
The first F1 test is 4 weeks away, the first race 6 weeks from now. At the moment it looks as though Fernando Alonso will not recover in time for the first scheduled F1 test. He could miss the first race of the season.
However, at the time of publishing this article Alpine F1 released this updated press statement on Alonso’s condition:
“Following his cycling accident yesterday Fernando Alonso was kept under observation in hospital in Switzerland. Medics discovered a fracture in his upper jaw and conducted a successful corrective operation. The attending medical team are satisfied with his progress.
Fernando will remain under observation in hospital for a further 48 hours.
Looking forward, after a few days of complete rest, he will be able to progressively resume training. We expect him be fully operational to undertake preparation for the season.
Alpine F1 Team and Fernando thank you for your wishes and will issue further updates when appropriate”
