Aston Martin chief outlines their ‘game-changing’ plan to catch Ferrari and Red Bull

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Aston Martin have many good aspects to become a very competitive team, but they have struggled to find consistency.

The British team finished a distant fifth place in the Constructors’ Championship as Aston Martin failed to challenge at the front of the field.

Aston Martin scored just 94 points this season and were a long way behind Mercedes in fourth as the German team took four wins over the season.

They were comfortably ahead of Alpine and Haas but took a step backwards after Fernando Alonso scored seven podiums last season.

The British team were in and around the top 10 and scoring points for much of the year but struggled to break into the top five at some races.

Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack admits that his outfit needs to step up in one key area to challenge at the front of the Formula 1 field.

The team boss also explained that Aston Martin must develop an ambitious plan to fight for race wins once they escape the clutches of the midfield pack.

Mike Krack admits Aston Martin are ‘not Force India or Racing Point any more’

Aston Martin took over the naming of the Silverstone-based team in 2021 after Canadian billionaire Lawrence Stroll became the majority owner of the British car company the year before.

Stroll already owned the F1 team after buying Force India and renaming the outfit as Racing Point in 2018, whilst also moving his son Lance Stroll over from Williams to race for the team from 2019.

When the team were known as Force India, they often struggled financially but punched above their weight with multiple podiums and a race win at the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix thanks to Sergio Perez.

But Krack believes that Aston Martin can’t think like underdogs anymore with the resources they have if they are to catch Ferrari and Red Bull next season.

READ MORE: Nobody at Aston Martin ‘dares’ to say one thing about Lance Stroll to his father Lawrence

He told The Race: “This is not Force India or Racing Point any more, and this is not an underdog project. This is not about surviving or participating, this is to get to the front. And that’s the game-changing part of it. And that is something that we have to grow into.

“For example, we were level with Mercedes at the beginning of [2024]; they have won four or five races. You see Red Bull was in trouble; they manoeuvred themselves out quickly.

“You see Ferrari was in trouble with the Barcelona upgrade, and they fixed it quickly. And we are not at that pace. We have not got this pace of reaction yet. And there you see that there are still a lot of things to put in place.”

Aston Martin started the season well, and Alonso finished fifth place at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix and beat Mercedes in Japan.

The British team then struggled throughout much of the 24-round campaign, but Alonso can’t call 2024 a bad year as Aston Martin signed Adrian Newey and made progress with the new factory.

Aston Martin are unlikely to challenge for wins in 2025

Aston Martin floundered in the midfield throughout 2024 and were overtaken by Mercedes and McLaren, in particular, in the development race.

They should benefit from the signing of Newey, who has had a lot of success in his career, but the 2025 car will already be developed before he starts work at the Silverstone-based team.

McLaren and Ferrari set very high standards this season as they battled for the Constructors’ Championship and have two very competitive drivers in their teams.

Aston Martin have also been held back by Stroll’s subpar performances at times and he has made some unforced errors. The Canadian was slower than Alonso most of the time, costing the team points.