Martin Brundle highlights 'tall order' for Aston Martin F1 team

Former F1 driver Martin Brundle has suggested it is a “tall order” for Adrian Newey to get his colleagues in tune with his vision so early on at Aston Martin.

Newey joined the Silverstone-based squad early last year as the head of its technical department and placed his focus on the 2026 car built under a fresh set of regulations.

The Briton has transitioned to team principal for the season ahead, replacing Andy Cowell.

Aston Martin's AMR26 challenger broke cover at the Barcelona shakedown last week as the team enters a new partnership with engine supplier Honda.

But while high expectations surround the team with Newey leading the way, Brundle has stated there are question marks floating around the new car.

When asked if he sees Aston Martin challenging for podiums and wins this year, Brundle told Sky F1: “I hope so - for everybody’s sake, and not least Fernando Alonso.

“Adrian, his cars tend to be quite homogenous in their beautiful sort of sweeping airflow to them. You often see that with all of it, and there didn’t appear to be as many bits hanging off his cars as you do see some others.

“It’s really hard undercut on the sidepod, and we’ve seen different interpretations of sidepods, front wings across the board, unsurprisingly, with such different, such new regulations.

“We’ve got to assume Adrian’s come up with some good ideas. 

“But does he know enough about the Aston Martin wind tunnel? Will he get correlation? Has he got the right people around him to interpret his brilliance?

“That’s a tall order, straight out of the box, actually.

“Adrian was saying to me that Honda, they’re having to play catch-up, because they were leaving and then they came back in.

“So there are some question marks there, and we’ll have to wait and see

“But you just know that Adrian will have a vision of how to maximise these regulations, and let’s hope he’s done it. Let’s hope that car just flies.”

Brundle downplays concern over late Barcelona arrival

Aston Martin's on-track debut at the Barcelona shakedown came on day four as the car was late arriving at the venue.

It completed just over 50 laps throughout the two days it was present at the track.

Brundle downplayed concerns over the late arrival of the car, stating it was a trademark Newey approach to only sign things off on his own schedule. 

“He’s also legendary for not wanting to sign things off,” he said.

“So when the car was late, it didn’t surprise me at all, to be honest.

“The long lead times, chassis, gearboxes, radiators, and all that sort of thing - Adrian will push that, and he always has done, to the absolute limit, because he wants the maximum amount of time of development on those pieces and understanding.

“He doesn’t have that control function of a Christian Horner or a Patrick Head or whatever these days. He’s in charge of all of that.

“If it absolutely takes off, then as ever, you can say he got it absolutely right. He’s waited until the last moment before having to commit.

“But we’ll see. We don’t know. I’m going to assume that that car will be pretty handy through the year.”