Aston Martin share Lance Stroll 'worst' concern

Mike Krack has conceded that Spa-Francorchamps will be the worst circuit of the year for Aston Martin, supporting comments made by Lance Stroll at the British Grand Prix.

The Silverstone-based squad's chief trackside officer highlighted that not only is the length of the lap — the longest on the F1 calendar — an issue, but also the characteristics of the track nestled deep in the Ardennes Forest.

At 44 laps, the Belgian Grand Prix is the only sub-50-lap round across the campaign, and the circuit has multiple long straights or flat-out sections, making it particularly challenging from an energy management perspective, something compounded by the already-underpowered Honda power unit in the back of the Aston Martin.

Whilst long-awaited upgrades to both the chassis and the engine are coming as soon as next weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix, the team — which has scored just one point all season, courtesy of Fernando Alonso in Monaco — may have to suffer through one last painful round before that reprieve.

As such, Stroll claimed the weekend would be "really difficult" and "probably the worst circuit of the year" for the AMR26, and Krack was obliged to agree with the Canadian.

"Yes, I think we know the sensitivities of this circuit for the various parameters of the car, and I think I have to agree with Lance," he told media, including RacingNews365.

"It's not only the lap length that we will suffer from, but also the character. So I think we can expect that."

A compromise to be found

The energy-poor nature will prove challenging for the entire grid, but Spa-Francorchamps will also likely accentuate Aston Martin's deficit, even more so than at the British Grand Prix, which was already a tough test.

"This circuit is quite tricky compared to Silverstone," admitted Shintaro Orihara, Honda's trackside general manager and chief engineer.

"We have long straights, and it's quite tricky in terms of MGU-K deployment distribution... So we have prepared some data, but we need to check what the best strategy is to cover the full long straights."

A compromise will need to be struck as to where teams use their power, and Orihara hinted that Aston Martin may have to think strategically, adding: "If we deploy at the beginning of the straight, we lose a lot of car speed by the end of it, so we need to consider where we should deploy."