Christian Horner admits to breathing a sigh of relief following Aston Martin's wrong call on tyre strategy for Fernando Alonso.

The Spaniard pitted on Lap 54, just as the rain had begun, switching from hards to mediums. However, over the course of the next lap the rain intensified and he was forced to pit again, this time for Inters.

Meanwhile, Max Verstappen, who had braved it out and remained on track, pitted a lap later in the worsening conditions, also switching to the green-banded rubber, the extra pit stop having cost Alonso his one possible chance of overhauling the world champion.

At the first stop, Horner feared that Aston Martin had stolen a march on his team, by undercutting Verstappen and switching to the Inters.

"We had enough margin with nine or ten seconds when he pitted that even being three or four seconds off the pace, we'd have still been three or four seconds up the road," said Horner.

"I was surprised they took the medium tyre and that totally got us off the hook and then it was a question of getting it to the pits and having us turn the car around.

"I think, in 20:20 hindsight, we should have probably pitted one lap earlier to go on to the inters," admitted the Red Bull boss. "But thereafter, he was very mature when the rain came. He took it steady and brought in the tyres and really closed out the race. So really, you know, the top drawer drive by Max today."

"For me, it was very clear that the track on that lap we stopped was completely dry, apart from Turn 7 and 8," said Alonso. "So how I would put the inters? It was completely dry. 99% of the track. So I stopped for dries.

"The weather forecast, it was a small shower," he added, "a small quantity of rain as well what we had as a team.

"We had a lot of margin behind us to put the dry tyres and if necessary the Inter tyres," he continued. "Maybe it was extra safe. I don't know.

"That minute and a half that it took to go through Turn 5, 6, 7 and 8 again, it changed completely. The out-lap on the dry tyres, it was very wet when I got to those corners. The lap that we stopped, it was completely dry.

"These are wet races in Formula 1," he added. "We had a huge margin behind to do two stops if needed, one for the dries and one extra for the Inters, and we thought it was the right thing.

"It was a complex race to read, to execute, and we are P2. I know there were a lot of questions in the TV pen about fitting the Inters and trying to win the race, but honestly, this is a different race to what we saw in the team.

"We are P2. So we are very happy. Very, very happy with the race, because the P1 was very fast today, in any tyre, any condition, Max was always 15 or 20 seconds in front of us. So there was no chance to win today."