The F1 World Championship starts in a few days and expectations are high. It is expected to be one of the most evenly matched championships in recent years, where there are some favorites, but where all the teams are in a position to spring a surprise. In this sense, Aston Martin is one of the teams that is ready to spring a surprise during the season, and the team is confident with the AMR25.
Expectations for this new season
Despite the equality between the teams, something logical given that we are on the threshold of the last season with the current regulations, there is one team that seems to be starting with a slight advantage. We are talking about McLaren, which took the constructors’ title last year and which aspires to complete one of the best seasons in recent years.
But we can’t forget Ferrari or Mercedes. The Italian team has already shown that it has a car that can compete, and the signing of Lewis Hamilton makes the team a serious contender for the title this season. The unknown factor will be how the competition between the seven-time world champion and Leclerc plays out. The young Monegasque driver is not going to let his goal of becoming world champion go to his head.
And in the case of Mercedes, the doubts are considerable, but they cannot be ruled out. After a low-profile test, the team is ready to do battle, and it is hoped that Russell, after Hamilton’s departure, will step up to put the team at the top.
Red Bull, the big unknown
The greatest doubts are generated by Red Bull: after their dominance in recent years, it seems that they are now far from that level, but they should not be ruled out, far from it, and even less so with Verstappen behind the wheel of the car. Their tests revealed several problems, and we will see if they are able to solve them in time for the start of the season.
Aston Martin aims to make up for lost ground
For its part, Aston Martin starts as the favorite to lead the midfield of the championship: despite the irregularity of the tests in Bahrain, both the team and Fernando Alonso have rated the performance of the AMR25 very positively. The Asturian driver himself admitted that the team has taken a step forward, and believes that during the season, with a good package of improvements and good decisions, the team could take a step forward to fight with the best.
The Aston Martin engine that scares F1
Although Aston Martin is keeping a close eye on what happens this season, it is already working on next year’s AMR26 with the introduction of the new FIA regulations. In this sense, its new alliance with Honda is already generating fear among its rivals, who are aware that the British team will take a step forward that will allow it to fight face to face with the best.
This is the opinion of Otmar Szafnauer, former director of the British team, who believes that Honda has the capacity to produce the best engine on the grid. Otmar Szafnauer is confident that the Honda engine “will end up being the best”, although he also believes that they will have initial problems in properly developing the power unit, but that they will know how to solve it in order to give Aston Martin the best engine. If we add to this the arrival of Adrian Newey, the AMR26 is set to be one of the most feared cars on the grid.
But these changes will come in 2026, and until then we must see how far Fernando Alonso can go with the AMR25 during this season.