Aston Martin insist updates have added performance

Aston Martin believes it has added performance to its car with its updates, even though it has dropped behind other teams.

The AMR23 was the second-fastest car on the grid at the start of the season, enabling Fernando Alonso to secure several podiums and put them second in the Constructors' Championship.

Aston Martin brought a significant update package to Canada with new sidepods and floor, along with smaller updates at the British and Hungarian Grands Prix, but its competitiveness has slumped midway through the season.

In the tight development battle, the team has now slipped behind Mercedes in the standings, as other teams including McLaren start to take bigger steps forward with their car.

Aston Martin improving overall package

Performance Director Tom McCullough believes all of these updates have made an impact when speaking to media, including RacingNews365: "I don't think it has fundamentally changed.

"You always have small changes, but I think that the biggest thing is some of the tracks are different, and some teams have developed at different rates.

"We have improved the car, we have brought performance to the car and, yes, there are some slight characteristic differences.

"But even you take the same car from track-to-track, you see slight characteristic differences too. So we're talking small changes."

A characteristic of the AMR23 has been its ability to perform well through medium and low-speed corners, which is why the team anticipated Monaco and Hungary would be their strongest tracks.

But there are other developments they have been focusing on to extract more potential from their car.

McCullough added: "I think one of the development threads we have this year was to get on top of some of our straight line speed and DRS, that maybe weren't as competitive as some teams at the start of the year.

"We're just trying to look at where we weren't as strong, trying to improve those areas, without losing the strengths of the car that we had before."