Aston Martin has acknowledged it must strike a balance between chasing mechanical and aerodynamic performance gains amid its troubled Formula 1 development.
For the second year in succession, Aston Martin has regressed in the pecking order as the season wore on.
Six podiums in the first eight races in 2023 established Aston Martin as the second-fastest team, but the Silverstone-based outfit fell to fifth in the Constructors’ standings.
In 2024, Aston Martin continued as the fifth-fastest F1 outfit, but as the rounds have ticked by, it has fallen away from the top four teams and into a midfield scrap with the Williams, Haas and RB on a race-by-race basis.
“I have to say, on the development side, two years in a row now we have rather progressed rearwards than forwards,” Aston Martin boss Mike Krack admitted.
“That is the reality.”
Like many other teams on the 2024 F1 grid, Aston Martin has introduced upgrade packages, only to revert back to an older-spec machine after encountering trouble.
These issues have plagued the likes of RB and Ferrari.
Red Bull too has encountered balance issues with the RB20, a car that is winless in the last eight rounds after being the early 2024 pacesetter.
Krack has assessed the situation, declaring the importance of improving mechanical and aerodynamic performance amid the tricky ground effect regulations.
“We try to improve the load, the downforce, and the balance,” he said.
“And then in which order, I think that it also depends on what kind of corners you’re having, what kind of circuits you’re having.
“You have circuits like [Singapore] or like Baku, where you have just short corners. Or like Monza with the last corner that was never stopping, where it’s more critical.
“But we have to improve both, because both are not good enough.
“It’s also always difficult to completely discern them, but we need to make a good step in both, because the drivers are not happy either when the speed is very low.”
McLaren and Mercedes inspiring Aston Martin F1 development path
Krack argued that Aston Martin was on a par with Mercedes at the start of the season and indeed, Fernando Alonso beat both George Russell and Lewis Hamilton at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
A gulf between the two outfits has emerged since then.
Mercedes has amassed 329 points to Aston Martin’s 86 in the F1 Constructors’ standings and the Brackley-based outfit has won three races this term.
Aston Martin meanwhile, has failed to reach the podium in 2024 with Alonso’s fifth place in Jeddah the team’s best result of the campaign.
“We were on level with Mercedes at the beginning of the season for the first races,” Krack said.
“So it is possible to make substantial steps with these regulations if you get the car stable, and behaving the way the drivers want it.
“So it is not this pure race for downforce that you used to have in the past, where it’s really difficult to close.
“Here it is more about getting the stability, getting the balance and the load, obviously, as well.”
As Aston Martin has regressed across the last two seasons, McLaren has done the opposite.
The slowest team at the start of last year, McLaren now leads the Constructors’ standings and has the all-round best F1 package.
McLaren has maintained its advantage in 2024 by optimising the components it has on the MCL38, rather than bombarding it with countless upgrades.
Krack wants Aston Martin to review whether the same is possible for ‘Team Silverstone.’
“We are looking at this a lot,” Krack said.
“If you compare the pace, and you see when have they [McLaren] made a step, and you can correlate that with some upgrades that are declared as we never have the full picture, there is some correlation where you can say, ‘okay, this is what it has been changed, and what has it potentially done’.
“When you see, for example, the Zandvoort upgrade, it’s a bit here, a bit there, a bit there.
“You see how fine and complex these cars have become, so I think it would be foolish not to look at it.”
READ MORE: Aston Martin set to investigate McLaren’s F1 upgrade blueprint
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