2026 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team

[FrukostScones]

I think the gear box broke and then PU did some random routine before it got shut off completely. the telemetry showed no throttle inputs for some hundred meters before the stop. Or the PU broke. it was definitely an event.

[ispano6]

When I credit Tost, I am crediting how Honda MEGA appreciated Tost's respectfulness and approach. None of this blame game that Alonso and his camp seem to always bring.

Sorry, but I can't imagine Max, Charles, Lewis, or any other top-tier driver being as patient as spaniard was during the Mclaren-Honda era. Sticking with the team, hoping, working hard (and yes, being occasionally cynical on the radio when full of adrenaline, while being helplessly overtaken by everyone left and right). Drivers usually complain and scream on the team-radio for minor annoyances during the race...

Actually, you bring up a very important point that I was going to mention. The personalities of the drivers that Honda worked with during the Toro Rosso years were either rookies or drivers that provided good development feedback. Albon, Gasly, Hartley, and Kvyat all played an important part in the development. These guys aren't the egos of former world champions and thus they have a more level headed and measured interaction with the engineers. Max was an excellent communicator that engineers could work with too, despite his outbursts (before becoming champion, he actually quieted up a bit since).

In that regard, maybe having Vandoorne(or Button) do the tests would be better, but I would prefer Stroll and Alonso drive the car in anger to see how much it can handle. Not to the point where they intentionally break something out of anger and then can't test for the rest of the day, but enough to really find the limits of reliability and durability.

And let's face it, Honda's running is limited due to their exclusive works partnership and only 1 team to develop the power unit putting them in the same boat as Audi. So Audi is the closest benchmark to compare AMR against it would seem.

[Leon Kennedy]

When I credit Tost, I am crediting how Honda MEGA appreciated Tost's respectfulness and approach. None of this blame game that Alonso and his camp seem to always bring.

Sorry, but I can't imagine Max, Charles, Lewis, or any other top-tier driver being as patient as spaniard was during the Mclaren-Honda era. Sticking with the team, hoping, working hard (and yes, being occasionally cynical on the radio when full of adrenaline, while being helplessly overtaken by everyone left and right). Drivers usually complain and scream on the team-radio for minor annoyances during the race...

Actually, you bring up a very important point that I was going to mention. The personalities of the drivers that Honda worked with during the Toro Rosso years were either rookies or drivers that provided good development feedback. Albon, Gasly, Hartley, and Kvyat all played an important part in the development. These guys aren't the egos of former world champions and thus they have a more level headed and measured interaction with the engineers. Max was an excellent communicator that engineers could work with too, despite his outbursts (before becoming champion, he actually quieted up a bit since).

In that regard, maybe having Vandoorne(or Button) do the tests would be better, but I would prefer Stroll and Alonso drive the car in anger to see how much it can handle. Not to the point where they intentionally break something out of anger and then can't test for the rest of the day, but enough to really find the limits of reliability and durability.

And let's face it, Honda's running is limited due to their exclusive works partnership and only 1 team to develop the power unit putting them in the same boat as Audi. So Audi is the closest benchmark to compare AMR against it would seem.

The point is that Audi is doing better than Honda and even Redbull Powertrain, the latter was considered by everyone to be a feat, simply less than 1000 employees to build from 0, without any previous history.

I don't know what they're doing to Sakura, but I don't want them to be too presumptuous with their ideas, and I say this as someone who appreciates the proud Japanese mentality (I have a Honda both car and bike and scooter at home, maybe I'm biased).

Then the strange thing, you know what? They didn't even use all the mapping because from the telemetry it seems that engine could reach 13,000 rpm. But then we look at the peak, Look at the curves instead, they are constantly under 2k rpm compared to the others, in terms of torque like everything else. Either they do it as a precaution to avoid breaking the gearbox, or I don't know, because when do you want to test the maximum potential? In Melbourne during free practice? That way you risk ruining the weekend, at least in testing you get an idea. I'm starting to have serious doubts about their program too.

[Artur Craft]

I´m expecting a very long year here with fans defending Honda like their own life and trying to put the blame on Newey, or anyone else, and claim Honda is great

It's started already

Yeah

Obviously Jambier is correct (great member btw). It´s not only Honda´s fault, everything seems bad right now but I guess the disastrous PU is hurting their running and overall development.

Are u ex-employee of Honda?

No and I even like how reliable their street cars are. I´m just not as much a fan as you seem to be

[bigblue]

Team summary is at https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/new ... hrain-2026

It includes:
Unfortunately, his afternoon session ended early after Honda identified a power unit-related issue and, as a precaution, the team stopped the car. It was returned safely to the garage for further checks and maintenance.

So the official team info identifies a PU issue. Obviously the onboard video shows the PU was at least running at time of shut down. Well, unless it expired after drive was lost and the increase of revs (perhaps some fault that meant loss of control, but not absolute stop of the engine, if we assume the issue was precipitated by the PU?).

[diffuser]

Team summary is at https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/new ... hrain-2026

It includes:
Unfortunately, his afternoon session ended early after Honda identified a power unit-related issue and, as a precaution, the team stopped the car. It was returned safely to the garage for further checks and maintenance.

So the official team info identifies a PU issue. Obviously the onboard video shows the PU was at least running at time of shut down. Well, unless it expired after drive was lost and the increase of revs (perhaps some fault that meant loss of control, but not absolute stop of the engine, if we assume the issue was precipitated by the PU?).

Maybe the PU cut the drive to protect itself.

[diffuser]

Team summary is at https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/new ... hrain-2026

It includes:
Unfortunately, his afternoon session ended early after Honda identified a power unit-related issue and, as a precaution, the team stopped the car. It was returned safely to the garage for further checks and maintenance.

So the official team info identifies a PU issue. Obviously the onboard video shows the PU was at least running at time of shut down. Well, unless it expired after drive was lost and the increase of revs (perhaps some fault that meant loss of control, but not absolute stop of the engine, if we assume the issue was precipitated by the PU?).

The way I understand what was written is the team told Alonso to stop the car by letting it coast to a stop. Likely they didn't want to risk using the brakes.

[bigblue]

I supppose so, perhaps they saw something on the PU telemetry, and requested him to stop. Whatever it was, the engine was at least still running, maybe the battery/electrical side given there was the flashing light once stopped. Then it did a good few seconds of high revving when in neutral (I had assumed there was some drivetrain / gearbox issue causing loss of drive, but I suppose it could be an intentional stop, into neutral, followed by a very odd bit of high revs?).

[ryaan2904]

I don't think people within the team are blaming anything other than time. It is always easy to say in hindsight what the team could have done to be better prepared and that onus usually falls on leadership. In this case it could be Stroll Sr. or Andy Green not being on top of what they could have been prior to Newey's arrival. Should Green have been more closely scrutinizing the power unit regulation verbiage and checking to see if Honda was reading in-between the lines? Could a gearbox been developed the prior season to mate with the Mercedes unit such that they could already be familiar again with "teething" troubles of their own design? Could it be that the requested packaging of the drivetrain is a debilitating factor that requires clever solutions that aren't legal or are in the gray area or simply cannot be fabricated at the track? Yes, Yes, Yes, but all in hindsight.

The current voice of the team that I pay the most attention to is Mike Krack. He to me, right now, is like the Franz Tost that AMR needs. Without Tost, there would have been no RedBull Honda championships. I hope Krack can be the bridge that Tost was.

Dude, I don't know where you got this information but Andrew Green is no longer working in F1 with Aston Martin. And Regarding Tost, it was not him who was responsible, but Redbull itself who lent the Honda engine to Toro Rosso to test it and the following year they also adopted it (in 2019). He was simply the team principal and as a customer team he followed the directives of Red Bull, Horner above all.

It was Tost who had a level head and never raised a voice in anger or blame. He was the opposite of Eric Boullier.

When I credit Tost, I am crediting how Honda MEGA appreciated Tost's respectfulness and approach. None of this blame game that Alonso and his camp seem to always bring. I would rather Krack as the voice of AMR than Pedro De LaRosa.

I have noticed f1 journalists are very quick to jump the gun and blame Honda for every problem sometimes. Honda started very late during the mclaren years and they started late this time as well. Both times it should have been expected for Honda to be a bit behind, just like f1 journalists expected the AMR chassis to be behind because of Newey's gardening leave. Yet the expectations from Honda seem to be sky high everytime.

I figured the way Honda turned things around from 2019 should have given people more confidence, but it seems they have forgotten it all. Maybe its because they don't attribute RBR's success to Honda as much as they do to Max and the chassis. Or maybe they just expect top performance from them at the get go. Idk. But I think having Andy Cowell there should smooth things over this time with better communication.

[zoroastar]

When I credit Tost, I am crediting how Honda MEGA appreciated Tost's respectfulness and approach. None of this blame game that Alonso and his camp seem to always bring.

Sorry, but I can't imagine Max, Charles, Lewis, or any other top-tier driver being as patient as spaniard was during the Mclaren-Honda era. Sticking with the team, hoping, working hard (and yes, being occasionally cynical on the radio when full of adrenaline, while being helplessly overtaken by everyone left and right). Drivers usually complain and scream on the team-radio for minor annoyances during the race...

yeah, alonso showed a lot of patience back then that he didnt get credit for. some people are such big brand loyalists that theyll hold a grudge about anyone who would ever dare speak ill of their brand. i guess he coulda always just left and drove for haas, who were regularly beating mclaren back then with that ferrari PU in the back

[Rasoose]

i guess he coulda always just left and drove for haas, who were regularly beating mclaren back then with that ferrari PU in the back

It's easy to forget that McLaren scored more points in 2016 with Honda engines, than in 2018 while using Renault - the same engines Red Bull was scoring podiums with.
McLaren eventually managed to turn things around, impressively, but I do think Alonso would have been better off leaving them sooner in hindsight. Failing to qualify for the Indy 500 with McLaren in 2019 was a painful, final icing on the cake.

[AR3-GP]

“Our engineers often fly to Silverstone, and also engineers from Aston Martin are working very hard in our factory in Japan. So this in itself is a challenge, and maybe flight costs are a little bit of a disadvantage for us compared to the European manufacturers,” Watanabe admitted.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/max- ... /10798784/

[diffuser]

If Honda are struggling. I don't understand it. I don't understand how they would NOT have learned their lesson.

[aran.vtec]

Team summary is at https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/new ... hrain-2026

It includes:
Unfortunately, his afternoon session ended early after Honda identified a power unit-related issue and, as a precaution, the team stopped the car. It was returned safely to the garage for further checks and maintenance.

So the official team info identifies a PU issue. Obviously the onboard video shows the PU was at least running at time of shut down. Well, unless it expired after drive was lost and the increase of revs (perhaps some fault that meant loss of control, but not absolute stop of the engine, if we assume the issue was precipitated by the PU?).

Maybe the PU cut the drive to protect itself.

This really looked like a drivetrain issue, car was stuck in gear and for some reason the rpm went to 13,000rpm twice but didnt move forward(almost as if it was out of frustration but there was no throttle input which was odd), if anything you try and protect the ICE by restricting the rpm as low as possible. No safety system will try and protect the ICE by revving it to max rpm twice

[FNTC]

Maybe control electronics issue? Or MGU-K? Very strange with the insane revs indeed.