Aston Martin boss Adrian Newey has revealed the team has been “at a disadvantage” for four months.
The biggest regulation change in F1 history could lead to a major shake-up in the pecking order, with Aston Martin potentially making a big leap forward under the influence of design genius Newey, who has helped create 15 championship-winning cars.
F1 teams have been allowed to work on 2026 cars from January 2025, with longer work allowed on the power unit side, but Aston Martin is already trying to catch up and was late to last week’s Barcelona shakedown.
Newey said on Aston Martin’s website: “The AMR technology campus is still evolving, the Coreweave wind tunnel wasn’t up and running until April, and I only joined the team in March last year, so we actually started from the back. It’s been a very busy 10 months on a very compressed timescale.”
“The reality is that we didn’t put models of our 2026 cars in the wind tunnel until mid-April, but most, if not all, of our competitors would have had their models in the wind tunnel since early January last year, when the 2026 air test ban ended.
“That put us at a disadvantage of about four months and meant that the research and design cycle was very compressed. The car was only completed at the last minute. That’s why we were fighting to get it in time for the shakedown in Barcelona.”
2026 Aston Martin F1 car (Credit: Aston Martin)
Aston Martin completed just 65 laps at Barcelona, the fewest of the 10 teams that raced there, with Williams missing the entire event.
However, when Aston Martin started the car in black on the penultimate day, it attracted a lot of attention as the car’s design was different from the rest of the grid, with aggressive bodywork to change airflow.
“I don’t think of my designs as offensive in any way. I’m just taking things forward and pursuing what I feel is the right direction,” Newey said.
“The direction we’ve taken could certainly be construed as aggressive. There are quite a few features that haven’t necessarily been done before. Does that make it aggressive? Probably not.”
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Sky Sports Martin Brundle shares his predictions for how Aston Martin will perform throughout the new F1 season
New Way: Aston Martin expects the car has ‘huge development potential’
Big development races are always held in the first season with new regulations as teams add significant upgrades to understand the nuances of the vehicle and find performance.
This is an area in which Red Bull generally excelled during Newey’s 18-year tenure, with Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen both winning four consecutive drivers’ titles.
Newey said the AMR26 was “more tightly packaged than Aston Martin’s previous six F1 cars since joining F1 in 2020”.
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Sky Sports F1’s Bernie Collins and Craig Slater share their thoughts on why Aston Martin was late arriving on track for F1 pre-season testing in Barcelona
“We’ve been trying to build something that we expect has very high development potential,” he said.
“What you want to avoid are cars that come out very optimized within that framework, but don’t have a lot of potential for development.
“We’ve been trying to do the opposite. So we’re really focusing on the fundamentals and putting effort into those. We expect there to be potential for development in the accessories, like the wings and the body and parts that can be changed during the season.”
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Adrian Newey explains why he will succeed Andy Cowell as Aston Martin team principal in 2026
When will F1 Bahrain pre-season testing take place?
With the introduction of new regulations, a strong schedule of three separate test events is planned before the start of the 2026 season.
With the private Barcelona shakedown complete, F1 will next head to Bahrain for two ‘official’ pre-season tests, with media in attendance and live timing from the circuit available.
Bahrain will conduct two three-day tests on February 11-13 and 18-20.
When was your first F1 race?
The team will then have two weeks to prepare for the season-opening Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne from March 6th to 8th.
The first practice session of the season will take place on Friday, March 6th, followed by qualifying on Saturday, March 7th and the opening race on Sunday, March 8th.
Watch every race of the 2026 F1 season live on Sky Sports, including the Australian Grand Prix from March 6-8. Stream Sky Sports now – cancel anytime with no contract
