Fernando Alonso reckons Aston Martin must retire from the Australian Grand Prix the moment any slight issue appears to avoid compromising the forthcoming rounds in the 2026 Formula 1 campaign.
The Silverstone outfit has been the talk of the paddock at this weekend’s Melbourne season opener, because problems have continuously struck the AMR26.
Its Honda power unit is perhaps the biggest worry because excessive vibrations have left the team without any spares and the situation is so dire, that Aston Martin thinks it’s limited to 25 of the scheduled 58 laps in Sunday’s race.
Aston Martin will start the contest in 17th (Alonso) and last (Lance Stroll) after the two-time F1 champion’s team-mate failed to leave his garage in both FP3 and qualifying due to mechanical faults.
Alonso said: “We will be flexible every lap, we will monitor the situation. As Adrian [Newey] said yesterday, we are short on parts, so there is no secret on that.
“And China is next week. So hopefully we can do as many laps as possible, hopefully we can do nearly the whole race.
“But, the first sign that there is something potentially wrong, we cannot risk running until we make some big damage and then we compromise next week. So we will have to be very flexible.”
Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin Racing
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Formula 1 via Getty Images
Aston Martin is arguably last in the pecking order and there were worries that it would be several seconds off the pace when finally hitting the track.
Alonso, however, did provide some encouragement in being less than a second off a Q2 appearance at Albert Park having qualified ahead of Cadillac duo Sergio Perez and Valtteri Bottas; Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz joined Stroll in failing to set a lap.
“I don’t think it does change anything, but it may change a little bit in the garage,” added Alonso. “The mechanics, they’ve been working flat out and changing power units day and night the last six weeks.
“So even on the other side of the garage, with Lance being so unlucky in FP3 and quali with zero laps, when you go on track and you are in the mix with a few cars, it’s a little bit better than being dead last, as we were yesterday.
“So maybe that’s enough to ignite a little bit of motivation in everyone in the garage. And that’s probably part of our job now as drivers to keep the morale of the team high in difficult moments.”
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– The Autosport.com Team
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