Barcelona has always belonged to Fernando Alonso, and this weekend he began to let it go. At the Circuit de Catalunya, the two-time champion told reporters that the 2026 Spanish Grand Prix is, in all likelihood, the final time the home crowd will watch him race a Formula 1 car.
"It's going to be a special weekend," Alonso said. "This is probably my last Barcelona race in Formula 1, so I want to say thanks to everyone."
The calendar is what forces the issue. Alonso turns 45 this year and his Aston Martin deal expires at the end of the season. More pointedly, Barcelona disappears from the 2027 schedule — Madrid takes Spain's race next year — and only returns in 2028. Race on for another season and the track still would not be on his route.
He set expectations low for the weekend itself. "I will try to enjoy the weekend," he said. "I will not be competitive and I will not be too long in the car in Qualifying. In the race, hopefully yes, but not at the pace that we all want." A single point in Monaco last time out, he stressed, has not transformed the car.
Alonso has treated the whole campaign as a farewell tour. "I consider every race I go to this year potentially could be my last time — in Australia, my last time in China, my last time in Monaco," he said. "Here in Barcelona there is a little bit more of that chance as it's not happening next year."
The memories run deep here. He won in Barcelona during his 2006 title run and again in 2013, and it is the earlier triumph that stays with him. "There were huge expectations for us after winning the championship in '05, and being on pole position, everyone expected us to win on Sunday," he said. "I think I will remember that one as a number one memory, and many, many things that happened on this weekend."
Whether this is the end of his racing career is a separate question. Alonso has said more than once that he remains "open to everything" after 2026, and that fatherhood has changed how he weighs the decision without removing the urge to compete. He sounded, by most accounts in the paddock, unusually settled about it.
For the grandstands, though, the takeaway is plain: one last Barcelona weekend, expectations parked, and gratitude two decades in the making.
