Even before a single wheel has turned in Melbourne, Aston Martin has already become the main story in the Formula 1 paddock. After a disastrous winter test, Lawrence Stroll’s ambitious project starts the new F1 era with a significant deficit, something that is closely linked to the troubled start of its engine partner Honda.
Finishing the season opener appears to be a utopia, as became clear during media day at Albert Park. But what exactly are the reasons behind it, and how long could a possible turnaround take?
What steps have been taken since winter testing?
To say that the season has started badly for Aston Martin would be a massive understatement. The team missed the first days of the collective shakedown in Barcelona and already managed expectations during its livery reveal in Saudi Arabia. In Bahrain it became clear why: the problems are numerous. The Silverstone-based team could not complete the desired mileage, meaning that unlike all rivals it was not even able to look at performance in the Middle East.
“During the Bahrain pre-season test, we experienced unexpected vibrations, which caused damage to the battery-related components of the power unit,” HRC president Koji Watanabe explained in Melbourne. “As a result we were unable to complete the mileage we had originally targeted.”
“The engineers from HRC and Aston Martin worked as one team to develop and evaluate multiple countermeasures. Based on extensive dyno testing, we have implemented the countermeasure that we believe to be the most effective solution at this stage, starting this week.”
Honda does not want to reveal what that countermeasure exactly entails in order not to disclose technical details of its 2026 engine, although Newey did say: “What we have achieved for this weekend [is a solution] that we tested on the dyno over the course of the weekend, and that has successfully, significantly reduced the vibration going into the battery.”
Why can Aston Martin not finish the Australian GP?
The aim is to prevent the electrical part of the Honda engine from being damaged as quickly as happened in Bahrain, although this is far from solving all the problems. In fact, heading into the race weekend Aston Martin already knows that it will not finish the race with both cars.
That is because the chassis – and ultimately the drivers – are still absorbing the impacts of all the vibrations, meaning that the physical discomfort in the cockpit remains extremely severe.
“What is important to remember is the power unit – the combination of the ICE and possibly the MGU-K as well – is the source of the vibration, it's the amplifier. The chassis is, in that scenario, the receiver. A carbon chassis is a naturally stiff structure with very little damping, so the transmission of that vibration into the chassis, we haven't made any progress on,” Newey explained.
The latter means that it would not even be physically responsible for the drivers to complete a full race distance Down Under.
Newey explained: “That vibration is causing a few reliability problems, mirrors falling off, all that sort of thing, which we are having to address. But the much more significant problem is that that vibration is transmitted ultimately into the driver's fingers. So, Fernando is of the feeling that he can't do more than 25 laps consecutively before he will risk permanent nerve damage to his hands. Lance is of the opinion that he can't do more than 15 laps before that threshold.
“We are going to have to be very heavily restricted on how many laps we do in the race until we get on top of the source of the vibration and improve the vibration at source.”
The first weekend will therefore be about gathering data and searching for a structural solution, while ensuring that the drivers’ health is not put at risk. In Melbourne it is all about balancing those two aspects.
How good is Newey’s chassis actually?
Due to these problems, the focus is still not on performance and the question remains how competitive Newey’s first Aston Martin design actually is. It is a question that cannot be answered in terms of pure lap times, although the legendary designer said that he does have a first indication. In terms of the chassis, he estimates the team to be at best the fifth-fastest on the grid.
“My assessment would be that from the chassis performance point of view, we are in that middle group, definitely behind the leaders. What’s that gap? I don’t know, but I’m guessing it’s probably around three quarters of a second, maybe a second.”
The latter is related to the fact that Newey was only able to start working on the 2026 car three months late, and that the new wind tunnel became operational much later than originally hoped. As a result, Newey focused on getting the fundamental aspects of the 2026 car right – such as the suspension and the overall concept – after which there is still work to be done aerodynamically.
“We have an aggressive development plan in place,” said Newey. “Already with what we’ve got to at the factory based on that development plan, have we had time to bring it here to Melbourne, then we would be significantly ahead of where we will be over the weekend.”
How long could a potential recovery take?
Before that potential can come to fruition, the vibrations have to be addressed and Honda still needs to make significant progress on the engine side. The final question is on what sort of timeline that could happen, although Honda itself does not yet have a clear picture of that – simply because the reliability problems still overshadow everything.
“From Honda's point of view, unfortunately we have not yet been able to run the power unit at the maximum RPM. It's still too early to say what the performance is, so let's first understand the situation,” Watanabe replied when asked about Honda’s performance deficit.
At first glance those problems mostly seem to lie on the electrical side of the power unit, but Newey explains that in practice they are closely linked to the pure power of the internal combustion engine.
“One of the problems with these regulations, is that the shorter you are on ICE power, the more you have to make up for that by using electrical energy, to cover for that lack of ICE power,” he said. “It means that by the time you really want that electrical energy on the straights, your battery has gone flat, so it becomes a self-fulfilling downwards spiral.”
This means Honda above all needs more power from the internal combustion engine in order to reduce the energy management problems that the drivers face. For that internal combustion engine issue the regulations do offer a safety net, the so-called ADUO system.
After every six races, the pure power of the internal combustion engine is measured, with manufacturers that fall more than four percent short compared to the best engine (the category Honda will very likely fall into) receiving two additional updates. Given the immense deficit of the Japanese brand, several such steps appear necessary to reach a competitive level.
The first priority, however, remains to resolve the vibrations and to simply be able to complete a race distance – something that definitely won’t be the case in Melbourne.
