Aston Martin Technical Director Dan Fallows says the team has designed a 2024 Formula 1 car with a “stable base” that should help it avoid the slump that occurred last season.
The Silverstone-based squad capitalised on continuing to develop the downwash philosophy into last year to emerge as Red Bull’s most consistent challenger early on.
But having amassed six podiums in the first eight races, Aston Martin encountered unintended “side effects from upgrades and was overhauled in the development race.
Despite recovering to land another top-three finish at the Brazil Grand Prix., Aston Martin slipped to fifth place in the Constructors’ Championship behind a resurgent McLaren.
However, Fallows believes that overcoming those troubles to return to a competitive standing was vital to providing a platform for Aston Martin to utilise heading into 2024.
“I think we have to look at last season as a fantastic season for this team,” Fallows told selected media including Motorsport Week ahead of the launch of Aston Martin’s car. “It’s the most successful season we’ve had, so it’s difficult to take negatives out of it.
“But we’re always looking to improve and learn, and I think when we look at the trajectory of last season, we gave ourselves some challenges and we’ve managed to solve them.
“We came off at the end of the season, having got on top of some issues that we introduced into the car mid-season and ended up with a podium in Brazil. So we just showed that there is a huge amount of determination and capability in this team.
“But it’s important to us that represented momentum, and we wanted to take that momentum into the winter and into this car, which I’m confident we have done.”
After experiencing issues with the final parts assembled for the AMR23, Aston Martin spent several rounds running cross-comparison tests between its two cars.
Fallows believes that represented a critical exercise to help the team understand the development direction it needed to incorporate over the recent winter period.
“I think it’s no secret that we took a pragmatic approach to the end of last season, we wanted to make sure that we use every opportunity to really learn the lessons that we needed to learn on AMR23,” he said.
“We had effectively a glorified test session almost in some of the races, but it was important for us to do that and we recognised that we needed to do something that was going to teach us lessons for 2024, and we did.
“I think to come out of that, having achieved good performances towards the end of the season, culminating at the podium in Brazil and fifth place, which was a great result for us. To come out of that, and then to obviously have that momentum going into this year, I think that was the really key bit for us.
“And having been through that process and continuing that momentum into ‘24, I think gives us a lot of confidence going into the season.”
Aston Martin has adopted a process of evolution with its 2024 car, but Fallows did reveal there have been multiple changes beneath the surface from its predecessor.
And while he is confident that it will prove to be a step forward, the ex-Red Bull engineer comments that the marque has been equally attentive to ensuring it can remain competitive throughout the campaign.
“We were very pleased with the step that we’ve made over the winter, we think we have made a step on last year’s car, which is what we wanted,” Fallows asserted.
“But in truth, it is a short offseason, and we were developing things that were relevant for this year, quite late on into last season. So the main aim for us is really to make sure that this car is a good platform to put those developments on during the season.
“We’ve seen, particularly last season, but also the season before, the in-season development races is absolutely fierce. And we want to be as competitive in that as we have been going into the new season.
“So that’s what we’ve been really focused on is to make sure that we’ve got a good, stable basis for us to go and develop the car and keep those updates coming and keep the performance coming.”
Fallows is convinced that the harsh periods Aston Martin had to navigate last season have positioned the team to address such shortcomings from rearing their head again.
Asked if measures had been put in place to prevent another mid-season collapse, Fallows replied: “We’re learning a lot about us as a team. We’ve learned a lot last year, and that includes operationally and about how we approach different things, how we approach putting developments on the car.
“There’s always a certain amount of danger when you’re developing a car that you’re going to have to make some trade-offs, and those trade-offs may or may not be as good as you’d like. And that’s just something in engineering terms you just have to live with.
“But we’ve learned a lot about these rules, and we’ve learned a lot about how these cars need to perform, and how to get the best out of the aerodynamics of the car.
“So, as I say, we’re confident we’ve learned a lot of lessons and that we can put upgrades on the car with confidence this year, which is exactly what we’re aiming to do.”
