Alonso trivia

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Ciro Pabón
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Joined: 11 May 2005, 00:31

Alonso trivia

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Alonso trivia:

- Youngest pilot and only spaniard to get a podium, a race and a world championship.

- His girlfriend, Raquel del Rosario, is the lead singer of "El sueño de Morfeo" rock band (Morpheus dream).

- Likes horror movies

- Rejected an offer to play goalkeeper for Vigo's Celta soccer team.

- Admires Lance Armstrong and rides bycicles

- Won his first race being 3 years old on a kart built by his father

- He got his racing pilot license by the "Federación Española de Automovilismo" being 4 years old.

- One family in Catalunya paid for his career, including the cost of entering F1, when Alonso's own family declared they couldn't afford the expenses any more. I believe it is Genís Marcó's family, a kart importer.

- He got third place in 1996 World Kart championship, ahead of Kimi Räikönnen. He was able to run on a scolarship paid by the "Federación Española".

- He rejected an offer from Toyota to run an F1 car in 1996

- He is called "Nano" at home (short for "Enano" or "Midget") and El Matador or El Toro by spanish press.

- When he got his driving license, being 18 years old and a "veteran" pilot, he made a mistake for driving too slow. He explained it saying that his family had been insisting on him "not to drive too fast during the test".

- The flag of Asturias, his home province, is blue with a yellow cross, and many people confuses it with the Renault colors when asturian fans carry it, because they are almost identical in tone.

- His helmet has the colors of the spanish and asturian flag. The yellow cross portrayed on the asturian flag and the helmet, with the letters alpha and omega, is called the "Victory cross".

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Taken from spanish Wikipedia (except the Victory cross part), when I noticed that the english version doesn't give this information.
Ciro

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Steven
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Joined: 19 Aug 2002, 18:32
Location: Belgium

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Fernando's new helmet (used in 2006) has a slightly more yellow design:

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It is however still designed according to the Spanish flag, while the Asturian cross is now a bit covered by the HANS attachment.

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johny
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Joined: 07 Apr 2005, 09:06
Location: Spain

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El Matador or El Toro by spanish press.
:lol: no, never they just call it el "nano"

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Ciro Pabón
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Joined: 11 May 2005, 00:31

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johny wrote:
El Matador or El Toro by spanish press.
:lol: no, never they just call it el "nano"
Well, johny, I do not live in Spain, but I managed to find some (not much) articles that calls him El Toro in the 166.000 hits I found in Yahoo about "Fernando Alonso Toro -Rosso -Rojo -Rossa"

"El máximo exponente de la furia en la cultura española es el toro y con este nombre se empieza a conocer a Fernando Alonso en el circo de la Fórmula 1." Noticias.dot

"En casa le apodan Nano, su rivales Magic y la prensa el Toro, debido a su gran envergadura en un joven de 1,71 de altura y 70 kilos de peso." Biografias.com

"Fernando Alonso, como un toro" Marca.com

"El "pequeño toro" se convertió en "un toro de lidia, un verdadero Miura en la manada Renault" El Tiempo, actually, colombian press.

I won't post URL's to articles that call him "Matador" because they are a lot. I found 28.000 hits in Yahoo about "Fernando Alonso Matador". I concede most of them are in the british press.

Anyway, if you are sure, could you correct Wikipedia's article?

More trivia I found thanks to johnny:

- Alonso takes 11,4 seconds for the 100 meters dash and 57,4 seconds for the 400 meters dash.

- Alonso's cardiac rythm reaches 160 beats per minute at Monaco. The last three laps he reached 218 bpm. His normal rythm is 60.
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Ciro

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Jason
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Joined: 17 Mar 2006, 09:12
Location: KL, Malaysia

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I think Fernando's helmet made him a bit faster. :lol: Nice design, Duh! #-o :lol:
Never regret what you do, but only regret what you don't do. - Jenson Button
http://batracer.com/-1FrontPage.htm?LW

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Ciro Pabón
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Ciro