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The problems at Aston Martin appear to be piling up for team principal Adrian Newey, and that’s before he considers his driver line-up beyond 2026.
Aston Martin may not have had the slowest car at the Australian Grand Prix, but they certainly had the least reliable overall package.
Lance Stroll managed to take the chequered flag, albeit 15 laps behind the leaders, while Fernando Alonso completed as many laps as possible without causing permanent damage to any of the important components of his car.
Higher or lower: Aston Martin will complete 20 laps in the Chinese Grand Prix before their first retirement
Internal frustration is building between Newey and Honda, with a bizarre press conference that took place before the race in Melbourne highlighting the lack of joined-up thinking between the two parties.
Lawrence Stroll has overinvested in Aston Martin when you look at how the team are performing, but soon enough, he and Adrian Newey will need to start thinking about next year’s driver line-up.
READ MORE: All you need to know about Aston Martin F1 team principal Adrian Newey
Adrian Newey ‘known not to rate’ Lance Stroll as Aston Martin struggles continue
A report from the Daily Mail has shared more information about what’s going on behind the scenes at the Silverstone-based team.
The report suggests that Newey is ‘known not to rate’ Lance Stroll, however, ‘dares not say’ that for fear of upsetting his father.
Stroll Snr has heavily supported his son’s racing career from an early age, but has typically gone one step beyond many of his rivals to do so.
When Stroll was ready to race in Formula 4, instead of simply putting up the funding for him to take the next step up on the racing ladder, he purchased Prema Racing, one of the most storied junior racing teams in Europe.
Stroll vetoed George Russell from being his son’s teammate in Formula Renault, as per The Race, and after winning the 2016 Formula 3 championship, he immediately stepped up into a seat at Williams to make his F1 debut.
Finish the sentence: In 2027, the Aston Martin driver line-up will be…
His father quickly sold off the Prema team once his son had graduated from the junior ranks before purchasing Force India in 2018, which became Racing Point the following year, and Stroll became their first driver signing, with the team eventually renamed to Aston Martin in 2021.
The length of Stroll’s contract is unknown, but whether Newey is in charge or somebody else, it’s hard to see him ever being replaced.
READ MORE: Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll’s life outside F1 from net worth to girlfriend
What could Aston Martin’s driver line-up look like for the 2027 Formula 1 season?
It will only take a few races for the pecking order under Formula 1’s new regulations to be fully established, and then the driver market will burst into life.
More than half of the grid could be out of contract by the end of the year, meaning there is the potential for plenty of drivers to move around.
That’s before you consider the likes of Max Verstappen having exit clauses in his Red Bull deal, the same way that Charles Leclerc and Oscar Piastri could theoretically move on.
Unless Aston Martin make a remarkable comeback very quickly, it appears to be less and less likely that Alonso sticks around for one more year.
The idea of racing in the midfield, if he’s lucky, based on how Melbourne played out, for another year, cannot be appealing to the 44-year-old.
You would imagine that Stroll will still be there in 2027 unless he loses even more interest in Formula 1, and while F1 Oversteer understands Aston Martin are open to a brand new line-up next season, it’s hard to see what calibre of driver they will attract right now.
Verstappen and Leclerc have already ruled out any interest in joining Aston Martin, and many other drivers, unless desperate to stay on the grid, might follow suit.
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