Aston Martin unveiled a “tiny package of updates” at Silverstone last weekend. According to Fernando Alonso himself, “it was a step forward,” although “depending on what we consider.” Are the new features Aston Martin brought to the British Grand Prix improvements? Not huge ones, but yes.
The ARM25 has taken another step forward and Aston Martin plans to continue working on it this season.
The performance of the AMR25 has not taken a significant step forward this weekend, although it was clear that “everything went well,” as the Spanish driver pointed out. In fact, Alonso did notice an improvement, at least in some areas of the Silverstone circuit.
This is how it looked from that race. As soon as Aston Martin’s upgrade package gave the AMR25 a little more pace, Alonso has scored points in every race except Imola, due to bad luck, and Monaco, due to the car’s reliability. The engine failed him, and there’s nothing you can do about that, but he also had a good qualifying session, finishing seventh this time, while his teammate, Lance Stroll, was nineteenth. To show the difference in level.
In a grid as evenly matched and compressed as the current one, any update package that brings an improvement in performance is always welcome and can give an indication of how far they can go. This is true no matter how small the improvement. This is something Aston Martin has learned, especially after the important step they took with what they brought to Imola. In Great Britain, on the track located just 200 meters from their mega factory, they brought a new floor and modified part of the bodywork.
The margin of the current Aston Martin allows them to continue stretching its performance this year
In other words, Aston Martin’s technicians, workers, drivers, and Adrian Newey himself are aware that this AMR25 still has a way to go.
Perhaps at this point the goal would have been different at the beginning of the year, but there is a palpable feeling at Silverstone that the green car still has significant room for improvement. Alonso already said it in Austria: “Dreaming of the podium” until Abu Dhabi is possible. The change in the team’s fortunes is no coincidence. Until the Imola GP, Aston Martin was one of the teams furthest behind on the grid.
However, with the improvements made at the Italian track and a better understanding of the car, Fernando Alonso has made it into Q3 in four of the last six weekends and has scored points in the last four consecutive races: 9th in Barcelona, 7th in Canada, 7th again in Austria, and 9th in Great Britain. He now has 14 points and the team is locked into a fierce battle in the midfield alongside Racing Bulls, Williams, and Sauber.
A totally different car
Alonso admits that he is gradually feeling more comfortable in an Aston that is a completely different car. More consistent, more stable and, above all, faster. Based on all this, and with the data gathered on the track, the engineers believe it is feasible to continue improving the performance of the current AMR25 without compromising the 2026 car.
In fact, Alonso did not hesitate to point out that Newey, although he can give some advice, has not touched the current car: “When we ask him about this year’s car, Newey goes into another room,” he confessed.
Of course, the team makes no secret of the fact that there is still work to be done to fully understand the car, but it celebrates the steps taken so far: “Fully understanding a Formula 1 car is a huge challenge, but also very rewarding. Every experiment, every test, every iteration brings us a little closer. We had no problems and now we will have another significant update to bring to Spa. The parts we took to Silverstone are the result of the work of a small group of aerodynamicists with a courageous mindset. It’s part of our process of transforming knowledge into performance,” he explained to the media last weekend.
All in all, and continuing in this vein, at least until the summer break, it is believed that this car still has the potential to move up the standings and, as Alonso maintained, close the gap to the four cars that are sharing the podiums and victories.
At least a couple more updates are planned: the first at Spa
Because, with the exception of Silverstone, since Imola, the AMR25 has been constantly fighting to be the fifth car on the grid, the best of the rest. They achieved this in Monaco (until Fernando’s engine failure), and they repeated it in Canada and came close to doing so in Austria—where they did not bring any new parts—and were neck and neck in that position during the last Grand Prix.
“We are in that division between being able to improve things and not spending money for next year. Now it will be a battle between drivers, strategy, and different cars until Abu Dhabi,” said the Spaniard. For the future, many eyes are on Newey, who appeared with his green notebook at Silverstone and took charge of inspecting the McLaren, the strongest car on the grid.
That is why at least a couple more improvements are on the horizon. The first, as announced by the team through Cowell, will be at the next Belgian Grand Prix at the end of July at the Spa circuit, a very fast track that combines slow corners. There, we will see once again if Aston Martin can aspire to something more.