While Red Bull has a perfect record of three victories in its opening races in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Australia, Mercedes overtook Aston Martin as the second-best team in the latter race.

But the canceled return to China now leaves a gap of four weeks on the calendar until the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on April 28-30.

Given the suspension before returning to Europe after a series of flying races, the teams are expected to roll out their first major car upgrade package in Baku.

Alonso believes the introduction of new performance-enhancing components will open the door to more frequent changes to the competitive order as the season progresses.

Asked whether falling behind Mercedes in Melbourne heralded a pinch battle between Aston and the three-point star, the double world champion said: “It seems like qualifying is important now because the pace of the game is very strong. Similarly, I think now that we’re getting into a part of the season, it’s going to be very interesting: which team is developing the car faster?

“I think the first three races are so far away from Europe that it’s hard to bring upgrades and stuff like that. But from now on, maybe we’ll see the level of teams change a little bit from race to race, depending on who brings enough. Nice upgrade.”

For example, McLaren has promised a major update to its limited MCL60 in Baku, although expectations of an immediate hit have been downplayed following a disappointing start to the season.

Meanwhile, Mercedes has teased what appears to be a promising aerodynamic component currently being tested in the wind tunnel, and has changed the suspension setup to improve mechanical grip.

But motorsport boss Toto Wolff said the updates would not arrive until the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in late May at the earliest.

Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes F1 W14, Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin AMR23

Photography: Steve Etherington/ motorsport pictures

Two-time champion Alonso said it was already a successful season for the team after his podium hat-trick, even though his Aston team lost the developmental battle.

Alonso continued: “It’s all about happy days. We never thought we’d be on the podium, maybe even be on the podium all season, and we’ve had three out of three races. So, Everything is now a plus.

He added: “We took every opportunity we had, we needed to learn, we needed to grow as a team and maybe now we’re off track because we’re racing against Red Bull, Mercedes, Ferrari – these teams are used to this. speed of development and things like that.

“Maybe we’re just in the learning process. So we go into 2023 with great humility and let’s see how it goes.”