This forum contains threads to discuss teams themselves. Anything not technical about the cars, including restructuring, performances etc belongs here.
As title, seems to be a natural curiosity about the next generation of car with Honda PU.
To give this a platform that's not within this years car, interest in AN impact on that design specifically, new gearbox etc should untangle it from current (2025 season) speculation and commentary.
Not really related to the 2026 car or engine but on the livery. I see some potential for a special livery next year with Ma'aden and Honda white combined with Aston green. Picture the 2025 one but with much more white on it. It could look great.
This will be unpopular but I think people are pinning way too much hope on Newey. Given the time, could he and AM get to the top eventually? Sure. But it's not like he came into Red Bull and they won right away. It took four years. And sure, AM has top-class infrastructure and infinite money which might theoretically get you the best chance of success. But how many races did Toyota win? How many UCL titles does PSG have? Money and/or raw talent is no guarantee of success.
Let's be real here. Force India finished 5th, 4th, and 4th in the WCC in the three years before the Stroll era. With no money and two "midfield" drivers. Since then, (when they design their own car instead of copying Mercedes) they only have two P5s in the WCC despite having most of the "roadblocks" to success removed. Two P5s in 5 years (not counting Tracing Point season). And while Newey is good, it took *eight years* of the turbo-hybrid PU rules for a Newey car to win a championship in that era. Why makes people think that "this time it will be different" with any factual reasoning beyond fandom and blatant hope?
"You can't argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience"
- Mark Twain
Aston should win in 2026, with the list of everything they now have at there disposal, new factory, new wind tunnel, new simulator, works engine deal, Adrian Newey, Fernando Also, etc.
I just can't see it happening though, F1 is more about the sum of the parts than the pieces individually.
There are too many things to fit perfectly all at once. And it would seem as if every time they want to shortcut the time to become a big team it paradoxically drags on another year and ends up with Lawrence getting angry.
It needs more time to gel and also Lawrence to stop putting so much pressure on the team. I do think eventually there will be great success but more towards 2028 perhaps
Aston should win in 2026, with the list of everything they now have at there disposal, new factory, new wind tunnel, new simulator, works engine deal, Adrian Newey, Fernando Also, etc.
I just can't see it happening though, F1 is more about the sum of the parts than the pieces individually.
I don’t see it. They have no championship pedigree as a team and the individual team members who do have pedigree are getting on in years. The financials behind the team are also questionable, the car brand is struggling badly and they are spending enormous amounts of money in F1. What happens if there’s a recession? Between becoming a championship winning team and becoming the next Toyota, I think the latter is more likely.
The financials behind the team are also questionable
Haha, the only thing which is perfectly fine.
AMR has nothing to do with the car brand.
Except it does through common ownership. Stroll's investment consortium Yew Tree are the owners of AMR and the biggest shareholder in AML, and AML is losing a lot of money. When you have hundreds of millions of dollars being invested in AMR and you have hundreds of millions of dollars being lost in AML at the same time, that puts a lot of pressure on ownership. In fact, I think you likely saw this a couple of years ago when Stroll sold a stake in the F1 team, that equity was probably going towards financing all this F1 spending. If the F1 team doesn't deliver championship contending success soon, and the car brand keeps losing money, I think you're going to see a change in ownership like Toyota.
Stroll is part-owner of AMR over the Racing Point Limited from the British Virgin Islands, owned by himself, the yee tree consortium is invested in AML, as far as I understand it.
He sold shares from time to time to private equity firms and gave shares as benefits to private persons (like Newey, Whitmarsh or even Fallows).
Behind AMR stands Saudi Arabia as the main partner (they invest through their companies reportedly nearly 100m/year) and are (rumoured) very willing to overtake the team. They were also a (rumoured) force behind the Newey deal, as they try with VER.
I think noone should worry about AMR, as long as the Saudis are behind the team.
