Tag Archives: formula-one

Fernando Alonso says his eighth place for Aston Martin in the Singapore GP was “better than our best dreams,” while stressing that the Silverstone team has to “raise the level.”

Alonso qualified seventh at the Marina Bay track, helped by problems for Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.

It was inevitable that the two Ferrari drivers would come through in the race, but Alonso also managed to gain a place from Nico Hulkenberg with an earlier stop.

Haas didn’t immediately respond as its focus is on championship rivals RB and Williams, and thus Alonso was able to secure eighth.

The Spaniard agreed that he couldn’t have done any better with the car he had.

“Absolutely, I think behind the top four teams, just in front of Checo,” he said. “So normally it’s ninth and 10th available today.

“Finishing eighth is better than our best dreams. So again, good points, but still one lap behind, and not great pace, a difficult car to drive the whole weekend.

“So we are just lucky we got points, but it was possible to be P15 and have the same feeling.”

He added: “I just tried to follow Nico and tried to undercut him at one point. But the Ferraris should have won this race probably, they were the fastest car this weekend. So it wasn’t my race.”

The Singapore result followed a sixth place in Azerbaijan, and Alonso conceded that while the two venues had been good for Aston Martin the results haven’t disguised the overall lack of pace.

“I think now we need to raise the level,” he said. “We have some new parts coming in the next few races, hopefully they help us to come back to a stronger performance.

“We have to, I think it’s a must. The last two circuits, they were street circuits, we did good qualifyings, and then in the race, it’s difficult to overtake.

“So we consolidate those positions in the race, but this cannot hide the lack of performance that we are seeing now in the last few events.

“The team is aware of that, it’s working flat out. When the car is performing, we are here to score points.

“When the car is struggling, like we are now, we still score points because we are delivering the job, but aware of the situation at the same time.”

With most teams carrying over a lot of this year’s package to 2025 Alonso stressed that it was important to finish the year in a good place with the AMR24.

“Obviously the cars will not I think change too much from the last part of this year to next year. I don’t see any revolution on any of the teams. So we need to make sure that we find the direction.”

Aston, Alpine and McLaren will be the first to try the 2026 F1 tyres

Aston Martin will kick off the test programme for Pirelli’s 2026 Formula 1 tyres after coming out on top in a draw for teams who wanted to become involved from the start.

The Silverstone team is to run an AMR22 modified to replicate 2026 downforce levels at Barcelona on September 17-18.

Reserve Felipe Drugovich set to drive as the date falls between the Azerbaijan and Singapore GPs, and race drivers Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll will be travelling.

Thus far Pirelli has only been testing the narrower 2026 tyres virtually, with the first physical prototypes due to be manufactured in August.

All teams are expected to participate in the full test programme with mule cars over the course of 2025.

However there were only three spots for the initial running in the latter half of this season, and all the teams with the resources to take part – such as ongoing TPC 2022 car test programmes – wanted to be involved.

To cut the list down to three a draw was made at the last F1 Commission meeting, with Aston, Alpine and McLaren all earning the right to join the early testing within this season.

“We will be the first team to test these ‘26 tyres,” said Aston team principal Mike Krack when asked by this writer about the testing. “There was a selection process or a lottery process because there were a number of teams who wanted to be part of this test programme.

“We were drawn first, so we are the first to do this, between Baku and Singapore, I think. So we’re exchanging with Pirelli obviously what the programme will be and we’re trying to replicate the car that has been defined from the FIA according to a technical directive. I think it’s 54 something like that.

“So we try to replicate as close as possible the figures that are requested and required, and work then with Pirelli on how we go about it.”

After this year’s initial testing Pirelli will have a full programme of 2026 running next year shared between the 10 teams, and culminating in the post-season Abu Dhabi test.

The idea of having a dedicated car provided by one team for the early running was abandoned some time ago.

“That was a proposal that was rejected by the teams,” Pirelli motorsport boss Mario Isola told this writer. “So we will have mule cars provided by the teams. They have the freedom to decide which car they want to adapt, from ’21 onwards – they can also decide to use an old 13-inches car.

“The first idea for 2026 was to have the 16-inch tyre with much smaller diameter, and the much smaller diameter was more in line with the old 13-inch tyre. So they said, okay, let’s keep open the opportunity to use also the last car with a 13-inch for that. But now that it was decided to stay on 18-inch no one is going to use this.

“They can use ’22, ’23, ’24, and ’25 cars. The idea is that if we test after a race, like we usually do when it’s possible on a Tuesday and Wednesday, they can modify a current car and race car to simulate as much as they can.

“They save money because they don’t have to fly an additional car for testing. For a standalone test it’s different, because in any case, you have to send the car. But for post-race tests it makes sense to use a race car modified for 2026.”

Pirelli has yet to finalise next year’s 2026 testing programme, which as usual is made more complicated by having to work around the busy race schedule.

“We are defining a plan for next year,” said Isola. “But luckily, we have already the calendar for next year, so it’s a bit easier, because we can make some assumptions on post-race tests and so on.

“We will send a draft to the FIA to understand who is available and where. I believe that everyone is going to test, because with this option to use also the current car, the race car is clearly an advantage for small teams. Maybe big teams want to use an old car, because they can work around the car to modify it more. But is their decision.”

The challenge Pirelli faces is to sign off on a tyre that will work for the whole 2026 season as downforce levels increase.

“We based our assumption on simulations we received from the FIA,” said Isola. “So it’s the latest available information, obviously with a bit of margin, because we know how fast the development is, especially during the first year.

“And when you freeze the tyre, you cannot change it for one year. So we need to be aware that our design is for the estimation at the end of 2026.”

Pierre Gasly says that Alpine Formula 1 team’s latest upgrade package allows its drivers to be a “more pushy” as they fight in the midfield pack.

The new parts were used by Esteban Ocon in China before Gasly received them in Miami, where the A524s finished 10^th and 12^th, with Ocon logging the team’s first point of the season.

As well as aero benefits the package created a valuable weight saving, the cars having been over the limit since the start of the season.

“I think weight is true lap time, you can quantify like roughly 10 kilos is three-tenths per lap,” said Gasly. “So it’s quite easy to quantify. But then even when you’re talking about a few kilos over a full race distance in terms of energy you put in the tyre, it does affect it.

“So it helps you in performance, degradation, all around. In terms of car balance, not a huge difference. You see with the floor, it’s a bit more downforce as well.

“It’s just like a tiny bit, but at the moment in that midfield just a tiny bit allows us to race a bit more, be a bit more pushy sometimes, be able to overtake or defend.

“And I think that was the whole point of the race. We had some great battles, I managed to even pass [Fernando] Alonso at some point when I didn’t really expect to fight with him. We just seem to be a bit more in the mix.”

Gasly conceded that Ocon’s point was a boost for the whole team.

“I think we are just showing we’re making a lot of progress,” he said. “Very positive for the team to open the account and get a get a point out of that race. The whole weekend was positive, I finished ninth in the sprint, as well.

“So yeah, a lot of positives, and great motivation for the guys now, I hope we can keep pushing that direction, and hopefully things can start coming a bit more our way on our side of the garage.”

He added: “We keep trying things, and it feels like at the moment the car is not really quite giving me the stuff that I like. But we’re slowly getting in the right direction. So yeah, it’s slowly coming, but hopefully we can see us fighting for top 10s a bit more consistently now.”