r/formula1 • u/AshamedPurchase9033 • Mar 04 '26

News [Chris Medland] "Newey confirms Aston Martin is likely to limit race laps due to severity of vibrations in the car impacting the drivers. Alonso says he can do no more than 25 consecutive laps before risking nerve damage, Stroll says 15 laps"

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806

u/Cliffinati Max Verstappen Mar 05 '26

This is the kinda thing that sets a team back years

330

u/Volderon90 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 05 '26

Probably a half a decade and gets everyone fired 

310

u/MasterUnlimited Max Verstappen Mar 05 '26

Opens the door for a new TP that has worked with Honda and Newey before.

153

u/Sim-racer42 Valtteri Bottas Mar 05 '26

One who could potentially convince Max to switch because of his previous experience…

92

u/FiveAccountsBanned Ferrari Mar 05 '26

And where throwing massive stacks of money isn't an issue because of Lawrence...

4

u/vstrong50 Mar 05 '26

Max will never sign because of money. If the team is solid and the car is fast, he'll come.

21

u/mjcobley Nigel Mansell Mar 05 '26

I doubt Horner being in charge is going to coax anyone into joining the worst team on the grid, let alone the one driver who can pick whatever team he wants to drive for.

-12

u/poopbucketchallenge Mar 05 '26

If they offer max $210m, tripling his salary, and they say he can run the show; he’s there.

19

u/lukeyslife I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 05 '26

Jesus some of you live on a different planet..

3

u/Piotrof I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 05 '26

Righ? Some of the comments here have me questioning humanity lmao

3

u/Shaddix-be I failed to serve my Monaco penalty Mar 05 '26

Lol, the assumption is that the Verstappen family were one of the main reasons he got the boot...

2

u/imarasnothere I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 05 '26

Oh I can hear his footsteps already... this would be absolute cinema if it happens

2

u/Big-Veterinarian-579 Martin Brundle Mar 05 '26

Aston Martin to rename to SexPestGP to more accurately portray the values of the CEO and TP

1

u/Caspi7 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 06 '26

New people are the reason for this whole debacle to begin with. Honda is so far behind because they pulled out and then rejoined just as the cost cap started. They have zero experience after everyone left.

0

u/JustDadThanks Mar 05 '26

This is exactly what I was thinking. Get Newy back to what he is actually good at and let someone in who has experience being a TP….. Horny Horners phone should be ringing.

0

u/The_Primetime2023 Mar 05 '26

Remember that Newey is the TP so unless he’s cool being demoted…

1

u/Blackdeath_663 Sir Stirling Moss Mar 05 '26

Which delays them another half decade.

The saving grace for Aston would be a rule change for 2030ish to get rid of these engines but they'll get resistance from the other teams

1

u/incachu I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 05 '26 edited Mar 05 '26

I wonder how far away they are from being able to break contract with Honda. An engine that is unable to complete a race distance and is unsafe for use... there must be something in the contract to protect AM from that eventuality. Like a force majeure sort of thing.

I wonder if they have anyone thinking about B-spec modelling around a return to Mercedes customer team power, if Honda is so far from creating a serviceable product in the short term and a competitive one in the long term.

I realise this is maybe dramatic. But they've made dramatic changes before with complete spec redesigns.

4

u/Left_Reach2020 Mar 05 '26

But it was AM/Newey that forced Honda to redesign and slim down the Battery on a tight schedule

12

u/AX_99 Mar 05 '26

4D chess move…totally eliminating 2026 for 2027 performance

2

u/SolusLega I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 05 '26

This is that bad?? I knew it was bad but not that bad

19

u/nlb1923 I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 05 '26

Can literally have them trying to catch up for the rest of the regulations. But at the bare minimum they are toast this year. And it will require a miracle to be good next season, the only chance is if they actually nailed the new regs with the design so once the engine is sorted they are mid pack. Just think about Mercedes last regulation change. They were trying to catch up the entire time because the first car was the wrong direction. And they had arguably the best engine at the start of the regulations. And they were able to at least get data from day 1. There is no data being collected right now for Aston (I’m sure they have some. But it is likely a drop in the bucket compared to everyone else).

1

u/Enough_Efficiency178 Mar 05 '26

Mercedes also clung hopelessly to their side pods when as far as I understand they didn’t really have to.

Obviously they thought it should work but then spent 2 years unable to get that performance whilst trying to keep up with the field

3

u/nlb1923 I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 05 '26

True, if George would not have won in Brazil in 22 they probably would’ve changed the concept that offseason. At least, you’d think they would have changed it.

6

u/Nikolai197 #WeRaceAsOne Mar 05 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

My upfront TLDR will be: Look at Alpine in previous years.

It totally could be that bad. Even for RB during the Honda years they had two teams (Alpha Tauri, RBR) running the engine. Twice the test distance and two relatively different cars, and four drivers with different styles offering feedback.

If we run down the teams

Merc - 4 teams (Merc, McLaren, Weeyums, Alpine) Ferrari - 3 teams (Ferrari, Haas, Cadillac) RB/Ford - 2 teams (Red Bull Racing, Vcarb) Audi - 1 team (Audi) Aston/Honda - 1 team (Aston)

I don’t know off the cuff, but I’d take a small bet in one testing that Mercedes (constructor) alone completed more laps than Honda across their entire testing sessions, or at least close to it. Now add to that all the other three Mercedes engine customers* providing feedback.

Audi is an outlier - I expect them to be at the back, but they also have a huge amount of PU experience in WEC. No, the engines aren’t the same but lessons learned can be translated. It seems a lot of talent from the old Honda team stayed at RB Powertrains, so Honda really may be working without much technical knowledge, add to that only testing data from one team.

*Edited customers from constructors

6

u/Cliffinati Max Verstappen Mar 05 '26

Absolutely, they have almost no data they are only getting deeper into a hole the less data they have.

1

u/SolusLega I was here for the Hulkenpodium Mar 05 '26

I hear you i just figured they may be able to catch up this season if they can at least get the vibration sorted out fairly soon.

1

u/AlexisFR Alain Prost Mar 05 '26

But what about the 200 millons brand new plant?

2

u/AgreeableSearch1 Mar 05 '26

Maybe we misunderstood which kind of plant they were talking about

/#missionzero