Disenchanted Alonso paving way for Indycar switch

Alonso's plight is well known; one of the top three drivers of the current era has been toiling at the wrong end of the grid for too long with no real sign that his McLaren team will become a serious championship contender any time soon.

Ditching Honda for Renault did not provide the 'magic button' to propel them to front of the grid competitiveness that the team naively predicted at the time of announcing the deal for their new era.

For Alonso, options to remain in Formula 1 with a top team are virtually non-existent: Red Bull will not take him, Mercedes don't want him and the bridge to Maranello has been burnt despite efforts by longtime mentor Flavio Briatore to rebuild it.

A miserable weekend in Monaco added to Alonso's frustrations which bubbled over when he dubbed this edition of the Monaco Grand Prix "the most boring ever" and then went on to watch the Indy 500 on TV which he referred to as "a REAL race" in a tweet on Sunday night.

Meanwhile, McLaren chief Zak Brown has admitted that his team are considering alternative race programmes and Indycar is a big attraction for the team who have won the Indianapolis on three occasions in the seventies.

Various sources in Spain have reported that Brown and Alonso's manager Luis Garcia Abad are heading to Detroit Grand Prix this weekend with the view of setting up a partnership with a team to run Alonso in a McLaren Indycar entry next year.

They will be accompanied by Gil de Ferran, double IndyCar champion, winner of the Indy 500 and Alonso's coach when he tackled the race at the Brickyard last year.

The Brazilian recently joined McLaren as an adviser which allows them to tap into his expertise regarding their Indycar project. In addition, De Ferrán was also .

In terms of budgets, Indycar is small change compared to Formula 1. A big-budget Stateside is around $15-million for a year with a top team, in Formula 1 add a zero to that and double it to have a chance to be in among the top three teams.

Andretti Autosport - with whom McLaren combined with Honda to provide Alonso with his Indy 500 ride last May - is likely to be their preferred partner, but another option is reportedly also on the table for Brown and his team to consider.

We have previously reported Alonso's increasing disenchantment with Formula 1, but more recently Sky pundit Martin Brundle interviewed the Spaniard ahead of the recent Monaco Grand Prix and observed later, “I had a long sit down interview with Fernando pre-race and he gave me a distinct impression that he likely wouldn't be on the F1 grid next year.”

“That wouldn't have been helped by his retirement in the race, and post-race he publicly criticised Monaco and applauded the Indy 500. You never know with him, he could retire then un-retire very quickly, but I think even his relentless energy and motivation is fading,” added Brundle.

Apart from his 'full-time' job as McLaren's number one F1 driver, Alonso has also signed to race with Toyota Gazoo Racing with whom he won his debut WEC race at the Spa 6-Hours. His contract runs with the Japanese manufacturer until the end of the super season next year.