It’s an undeniably unenviable position for Aston Martin to be in, but the Formula 1 season-opener could prove to be a mission in learning how to improve its enhanceable new car.
The Silverstone-based squad has endured a torrid winter and pre-season testing schedule so far, with a great deal of problems lying in its Honda power unit.
After choosing to form an alliance with the Japanese giants and opt out of its existing deal with Mercedes, the Lawrence Stroll-led outfit has encountered many problems.
At pre-season testing in Bahrain, the AMR26 completed 692 kilometres, the lowest of any team, and around half of Cadillac’s total, the next team on the table of completed distance.
And when Fernando Alonso broke down on the second day, the reality of more extreme unreliability set in, as the team was, as a knock-on effect, unable to fully complete the third and final day.
It meant, as the other 10 teams began running in the morning, those in British Racing Green began to slowly pack up and ready its vacation of the circuit.
Naturally, every camera trained on Alonso, Strolls Sr and Jr, Newey and aerodynamicist Enrico Cardile were all to capture every facial expression deemed glum or pensive. Cue every keyboard-dwelling amateur body language expert’s opinion.
‘Oh, he looks angry!’
‘The face on him! He’s miserable!’
For the record, Motorsport Week walked around the paddock in Bahrain on both weeks, and similar faces were pulled by those at Mercedes, Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren. Actually, every other team come to that.
I think those expressions might be described as “busy,” “focused,” or, believe it or not, “working”.
Upon its return to the sport after four years out, Honda has openly spoken about its discovery of a lack of reliability within the battery of the 50-50 hybrid, with vibrations causing it to fail.
That, coupled with a lack of parts, saw it pack up its involvement in the Bahrain pre-season test a few hours early, with Chief Strategy Officer Andy Cowell working tirelessly in Japan with Honda to rectify the problem.
But with time running out, the Adrian Newey-designed AMR26, which caused so much excitement, may be restricted to a cameo performance at Albert Park this weekend.
Motorsport.com has reported that due to the ongoing problems with the PU, the team will run in qualifying, to ensure that it overcomes the 107% rule to confirm both Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll’s places on the grid, but will then retire the car shortly after taking the start of the race.
Motorsport Week understands that a constant and unrelenting stream of work and communication in and between Japan and the UK is ongoing to ensure improvement and resolution of the issues concerned.
This means that any assertions about an effectively pre-planned DNF are, right now, a little wide of the mark, as the team is heading to Melbourne with scope to try out what it has been working on.
The worst-case scenario is that little progress has been made, and the race will be a glorified test exercise.
Or, some I’s have been dotted and some T’s have been crossed and the horizon will look a little brighter earlier than some maybe thought.
What Motorsport Week thinks: Write the Aston Martin-Honda F1 project off at your peril
Its McLaren 2015-2017 nightmare aside, Honda has a proven history of overcoming early difficulty and coming out the other end successful.
It first entered F1 in 1964 and was a race-winner just one year later. When Williams took a chance on it in 1983, the initial teething problems turned into a bite that matched its bark, with title success with the Grove-based squad and then McLaren, with which it took the 1988, ’89, 1990 and ’91 titles, the former coming with 15 wins from 16 races.
The second iteration of its works team – which bought the BAR outfit in 2006, may have yielded only one victory, but the Mercedes-powered Brawn GP 001 had Honda DNA blowing through it like cherry blossom in a gentle breeze.
And its relationship with Red Bull? A win in its first season, a Drivers’ Championship in its third, and despite officially pulling out at the end of that one, its PUs propelled Red Bull and Max Verstappen
In this sport, it’s easy to take aim at the biggest names and organisations when things look precarious, or even kick them when they’re down. But is writing off Adrian Newey and writing off Honda clever?
Time will tell, but right now, speculation breeds prematurity in those judgements, and with their respective track records the odds are against those doing the kicking.
READ MORE – Ex-F1 boss makes Ferrari comparison amid Aston Martin struggles
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