Leon Kennedy wrote: ↑18 Feb 2026, 15:12
Andi76 wrote: ↑18 Feb 2026, 14:21
hollus wrote: ↑18 Feb 2026, 13:36
I think the team was fully there by the tome they showed up in Barcelona. If not, they must have realized it by now.
It seems to be the fans (this one included) that will need to accept it.
With a Newey car starting design late and new engine and new rules… it was maybe to be expected.
Not the first time a new Newey beast stutters off the start line. It often ends well?
Let's be honest—people who expected something different don't really understand how F1 actually works. An engineer can be as good as he wants, but whether it's Ross Brawn, Adrian Newey, Rory Byrne, Marshall, or James Allison—everyone depends on the organization and on a team, the methodologies, technology, etc. that are available, and how good they are and how well they work. Anyone who thinks you can just put Adrian Newey at Aston Martin and suddenly they'll be beating the whole of F1 doesn't understand what it's all about and how F1 works. It took Newey over three years to get Red Bull up to speed; until then, his cars were lagging behind. Ross Brawn and Rory Byrne also needed several years at Ferrari, even though they were already competing for titles in their second year. Some people may still think of Newey at McLaren, who competed for the title and won in 1998, his first year with the team. But they forget that McLaren was already on the rise before Newey arrived and many of the concepts for the 1998 car were already well developed when he joined. (McLaren had already tested cars with a longer wheelbase of over 3000 cm in 1995, 1996 and 1997, so I honestly think it's a myth that Newey was really responsible for the long wheelbase on the MP4-13; at the very least, it would be a strange coincidence...). They were already at the top level, and Newey's input was an added bonus. Aston Martin is far from the top level, even if it has the most modern infrastructure. You also have to be able to use it efficiently and have the right organization, technical level, and know-how. AM is a long way from that, and even Adrian Newey will need time here, even if the circumstances and the latest technology will speed things up, as will other top engineers such as Cardille and Fainello. But even Brawn, Byrne, Newey, Marshall, Allison, and Costa can't just snap their fingers and suddenly be number one. And I personally think it's positive that the new generation of F1 fans are also being shown that F1 doesn't work like that and that the media-created legend of the godlike engineer who comes along and, no matter where he is, conjures up the most ingenious and fastest cars out of thin air, and where every invention comes from their ingenious pen, is once again being demonstrated for what it is – namely false. Because as important as people like Newey are, because they understand the car as a whole and how everything has to work together (while younger engineers are more specialized and lack that level of knowledge) they are not magicians who build and design every screw, every aerodynamic surface, and every wishbone themselves. It is a team of thousands of people who do this. Engineers like Newey use their knowledge to ensure that everything runs in the right direction and everything harmonizes. And ultimately, that is the skill of these people, not the design and construction of individual parts. Rather, it is providing the technology, infrastructure, methodologies and organization that makes it possible to build and develop an F1 car better (which includes the "harmony" of the car working as a "whole") and faster than the competition.
Everyone has their own opinion, but in 2023, Aston Martin was fighting for podiums right from the first races, so it was already a team ready to compete. The talent was there even before Newey arrived.They probably have the best wind tunnel and simulator in all of F1. Now they're also engine specialists and can integrate the engine with the suspension and chassis. They've taken on several other engineers, in addition to Newey. like Cardile who had already made a great chassis at Ferrari, Bob Bell and Cowell who was the guru of Mercedes engines. If your theory were true then McLaren's 2023 performance wasn't just meant to be. And in 2024 Marshall completely overhauled the team. Williams hasn't even won a single world championship since Newey, going from a resounding winner to a mediocre one in 1998. And there's more data that points to the Newey effect: all of Newey's cars (except those that haven't raced) have achieved at least one podium finish so far, and 80% have won a race so far. You'll see who have right
Sorry, but that's not a theory. It's a fact. History proves it, and every F1 engineer has explained it a thousand times. Even Newey himself... I don't want to be condescending, but how old are you? How long have you been involved with F1? Sorry to say this, but it can't be long, otherwise you would know that Newey's career itself contains the evidence, as do those of many other star F1 designers, all of whom have explained these things themselves. It's not for nothing that people always talk about three-year plans. And it's only logical when you think about it.
Unfortunately, you're falling victim to the "Newey effect," which all too often confuses correlation with causation and underestimates the immense technological complexity of modern Formula 1. Today's F1 cars consist of around 14,500 individual parts – no one in the world, not even Adrian Newey, can keep track of them all in their head, let alone design them single-handedly. Anyone who believes that the mere presence of a genius would turn an organization of over a thousand employees into a serial winner at the snap of a finger is not only misjudging the hard facts of F1 history and the mechanisms within an F1 team, but also mathematics.
First, let's take a look at the statistics: The claim that 80% of his cars won is correct, yes, when viewed simply and glossed over. There were models such as the MP4/18, which did not compete in a single race, or the MP4/19, which first required a massively modified B version, or the 2006 McLaren or the 1998 Williams, in the design of both of which he was involved as chief engineer, and which must be taken into account if one does not want to gloss over the figures. That lowers Newey's rate to around 70% (a rate that people like Rory Byrne and Aldo Costa also have, both of whom, incidentally, mostly beat Newey as chief designers in the early 2000s and 2010s – yet Costa's cars at Dallara are not winning at Le Mans now, nor did Byrne's Ferraris win immediately in the 1990s... . for the reasons mentioned...). But be that as it may, even 70% is undoubtedly impressive, but it also shows that almost every third year/car did not win – mostly because the organizational basis in the team was not right. Just read Newey's book... He'll explain to you himself why the 2003 McLaren didn't win and why it was due to organizational issues within the team...
And let's look at the reality at Red Bull: Newey joined the team in 2006. Nevertheless, Red Bull languished in midfield in 2006, 2007, and 2008, finishing 7th, 5th, and 7th again in the constructors' championship. Why didn't he snap his fingers, which you believe he is capable of doing? Or did he suddenly have a stroke and need to recover? It wasn't until 2009 – in his fourth year and aided by a massive rule change – that the breakthrough came. As I said, Newey's own history alone refutes you and proves the opposite, because those three years of preparation were necessary to fundamentally restructure the entire internal organization, the correlation between the wind tunnel and the track, and the work processes. A genius without a perfectly functioning tool in the form of a well-coordinated team is simply powerless.
History is full of examples that prove this. John Barnard, the technological pioneer of the 1980s, failed several times at Ferrari to "remote control" the team. He had the most brilliant ideas, but the organization in Maranello was unable to implement them flawlessly from a technical standpoint. Even the legendary duo of Ross Brawn and Rory Byrne needed several years to get started at Ferrari. They joined a team in 1996/97 that already had enormous resources at its disposal, and yet it took until 1999 and 2000, respectively, for the era of dominance to begin. The reason was not a lack of talent, but the necessary introduction of methodological discipline and new work processes.
Technically speaking, a technical director/chief technical officer (or whatever title he has) like Newey/Brawn today is less of a draftsman and more of a "filter." He sets the philosophical direction, but if the other 999 engineers don't execute the details perfectly, the basic concept is worthless. The example of Aston Martin underscores this: Although they have state-of-the-art infrastructure, the team first has to learn how to validate the flood of data from the new wind tunnel so that it also works on the race track. The fact that Williams crashed after Newey's departure in 1998 was less due to the absence of his drawing board than to the collapse of the structures he had established and the simultaneous loss of Renault factory engines.
A Formula 1 team is a highly complex machine made up of thousands of cogs. Anyone who believes that you can throw a genius in at the top and immediately get a winning car out at the bottom, without taking into account the years of organizational fine-tuning, fails to recognize that F1 is a team sport at the molecular level. Newey will bring Aston Martin forward—but he will need time to do so, just as he needed at Red Bull.
To be honest, I don't know why I'm talking and explaining so much—it's just logical, and anyone who has ever had anything to do with F1 or even just spoken to an engineer knows that, sorry... or even just read an interview or a book or two... as I said, Newey will be successful. Just as Brawn and Byrne were successful at Ferrari, or Costa at Mercedes. But not just because they come in and snap their fingers... but because they create organizations and structures, implement methods and principles and philosophies as well as technology. But they don't just snap their fingers. If that were the case – and once again, even recent history proves you wrong – Newey would have snapped his fingers and conjured up a decent gearbox for Aston Martin... and not one that is obviously just bad... why? Because the technology for it is lacking. And Newey doesn't build gearboxes... perhaps this simple current example makes the connections clear.
Car looks quite tricky atm - in fact lots of drivers being caught out accelerating out of corners, seemingly when the MGU-K kicks in. Long way to go drivability wise