Aston Martin were delivered a huge reality check last year, plummeting from the top 4 group into the midfield. As the 2025 season approaches, team principal Mike Krack has outlined what success will look like for Aston Martin.
Top 5 return is the goal at Aston Martin
A fact overlooked in reviews of Aston Martin’s 2024 campaign was their encouraging start.
Fernando Alonso was only three tenths away from Pole Position in Bahrain, as the AMR24 showed strong qualifying performance.
A series of impressive qualifying results (including P3 in China) gave the British team reasons to be optimistic. Unfortunately, this positivity was short-lived.
Upgrades failed to produce the desired impact, which saw Aston Martin dragged into the midfield battle.
For the 2025 season, team principal Mike Krack wants to put pressure on the top 4 teams once more:
“The immediate goal is to start the season in a better place than we started this one and, from what will hopefully be a strong platform, make good development decisions…
“It is going to be a special season, because the switch to working on the 2026 car and the new regulations will come early.
“My guess is that we won’t see anyone bringing anything new to the track after the summer shutdown, unless there is a big title fight.
“Our goal for the year is to come to Melbourne with a much faster and driveable race car.
“At the moment, we have a division between the top four teams and the other six, and we’re on the wrong side of it.
“Success next year will be to bridge that gap and turn the top four into a top five.
“If we’re back in the Premier League, back in that mix, that will be success.”
One eye on 2026
In many ways, the next twelve months are not just about on-track performance. The priority for teams across the field will be to ensure their 2026 cars are on the right track.
For Aston Martin, who will begin using Honda engines in 2026, there is a particularly high level of activity.
Their new wind tunnel is coming online and will be calibrated in preparation for future development. This is just one part of the Silverstone-based outfit’s efforts to become more independent.
As opposed to taking Mercedes’ power units and gearbox, Aston Martin will be responsible for all aspects of their development.
Whilst this gives them more control over their own destiny, it comes with challenges and demands. To meet these, an influx of new personnel have been signed to the team over recent seasons.
The team’s latest big-name signings (Adrian Newey, Enrico Cardile, etc.) will work at an all-new factory campus. After years of construction and investment, all pieces of this puzzle should be in place before 2026.
Whilst Aston might have hoped for these elements to be in place a few months earlier, ideal conditions are rarely found in Formula 1.
A downward trajectory over the past eighteen months has increased scrutiny on the team’s capabilities of fighting at the front. Only time will tell if they can rise to the challenge.
