Aston Martin likes to emphasise that its Formula 1 team is in a rebuilding phase at the moment after the latest management and technical restructure.
Its performance in practice and qualifying for the 2025 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix demonstrated the challenges that lie immediately ahead.
Lance Stroll was eliminated in Q1 and Fernando Alonso used three sets of new soft tyres just to progress to Q2, from where he naturally failed to progress since he no longer had any fresh sets available – even if there was pace in the car.
“This is one of my favourite circuits,” he said after qualifying 13th. “Even from Alpine times, I’ve always been super fast in Jeddah.
“I think today I was pushing beyond the limits to reach Q2. And then in Q2, with a scrubbed set of tyres… again, another very, very good lap in my opinion – P13.
“It’s hard because if I crash, everyone will blame my mistake. I’m not satisfied with the position we are in. You push beyond the limits to unlock some potential from the car.”
That potential, though, has proved elusive. Throughout the past three seasons Aston Martin has struggled to build performance through upgrade packages, even when it has started the season with a reasonably competitive car.
Late last year it resorted to splitting upgrade packages across its cars so it could perform back-to-back comparisons between new and old specs in identical conditions, which is indicative of correlation issues with the simulation tools.
Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin Racing
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
The team would have been hoping for better since it has now moved out of the Mercedes facility in Brackley and is using its new, cutting-edge in-house tunnel.
So far the message from the team has been that it will remain cautious about throwing resources into the AMR25 which might better be deployed on the 2026 project.
That would be new managing technical partner Adrian Newey’s preferred option, since he played no role in the AMR25’s genesis.
Nevertheless it is understood that new elements including tweaks to the floor have been signed off and are making their way through the production pipeline.
Delivery cannot come too soon for Alonso, since he feels the trackside team has run out of runway in terms of trying to find performance through setup changes alone.
“It has been a difficult weekend,” he said. “We didn’t unlock any pace. We tried many different setups. All of them had more or less the same outcome at the end of the lap.
“So, we really need something from the factory, not from the trackside. I think we ran out of ideas at the moment.”
