Adrian Newey is ‘shackling’ Honda efforts to improve Aston Martin’s 2026 F1 engine

Follow us on Google Discover

Aston Martin are set to start the 2026 season as the worst team on the grid partly due to their new Honda engine, which Adrian Newey must shoulder some of the blame for.

The 2026 F1 season was supposed to be the year that Aston Martin firmly established a spot among the top teams after bringing Newey onboard and striking a works engine partnership with Honda. But pre-season testing in Bahrain painted a much drearier picture for the team.

Lance Stroll shared his concerns in Sakhir that Aston Martin appear to be four seconds a lap off the leading pace. He and teammate Fernando Alonso also recorded the lowest lap count by any team at the Bahrain International Circuit, with just 334 – 252 behind Cadillac on 586.

Reliability issues were rife for Aston Martin in Bahrain, for which Honda took accountability for the second week of testing coming to an early finish. Honda’s battery relentlessly failing in Bahrain left the Silverstone squad with a lack of spare parts, but it was not the only issue.

Aston Martin are currently facing a 38kph deficit to Ferrari’s engine! Do you think they’ll even QUALIFY for the Australian Grand Prix?!

Let us know in the comments below!

Comment

Like or Comment

Have your say Sign-in now for free

Adrian Newey’s aggressive car design is hurting Honda’s efforts to improve Aston Martin’s engine

Newey told Aston Martin’s rivals about Honda’s energy recovery problems, with their power unit unable to regain energy at the lower 250kw threshold let alone the maximum of 350kw. Honda’s RA262H engine even suffered from overheating, on top of a lack of outright power.

READ MORE: Everything you need to know about F1’s 2026 engine and aero regulations

And Auto Motor und Sport reports that Newey is partly to blame for Honda’s engine proving to be underpowered and unreliable. Honda gave Newey free rein to design Aston Martin’s car for the 2026 F1 regulations, but agreeing to build the engine around his ideas backfired.

Newey’s aggressive car design is ‘shackling’ what efforts Honda make to improve the engine in the Aston Martin AMR26. The most successful car designer in F1 history also did not help Honda or Aston Martin by delaying the final design of the AMR26 as late as he felt he could.

Aston Martin have to improve their chassis and gearbox, not just Honda’s power unit

A frank verdict from Stroll as Aston Martin look for answers 👀

Finish the sentence 'In Australia, Aston Martin will finish XX and XX'…

Comment

Like or Comment

Have your say Sign-in now for free

Aston Martin fell behind in the design of their chassis and Honda’s engine is far from where the team needs it to be thanks to Newey’s trademark wish to finish designing his cars at the very last chance. Additionally, Aston Martin have hit issues with their first in-house gearbox.

The Silverstone squad used to buy their gearboxes from Mercedes, as part of their customer engine supply deal. But as Honda have now left Red Bull and made Aston Martin their only partner, the team have had to build their own gearbox that seemed very fragile in Bahrain.

It is said that Aston Martin face a six-month timeframe to build a new gearbox to resolve the issues they encountered during pre-season testing. Their reliability woes ensured that Aston Martin could not complete long runs in Bahrain to try to unlock more pace through set-ups.