Analysis | Was it a brief upswing or is Aston Martin really attacking the top?

Fernando Alonso and Aston Martin F1 surprised - not least themselves - with three consecutive podium finishes to start the '23 season. With the European part of the F1 calendar approaching, an interesting period awaits the British team: was there only a brief upturn in the first few weeks or will Aston Martin manage to remain a serious threat to the traditional top teams?

With a little imagination, Brawn GP can be called the most successful team in Formula 1 ever. In all the seasons the team competed in the world championship, it captured both the drivers' and constructors' titles. More than half of the Grands Prix that Brawn GP started were won. Small note: Brawn only competed for one season, but thus made a smashing impression in it. Of its first seven Grands Prix, it won six in 2009, allowing Jenson Button to lay the foundation for his eventual sole world title.

Stalled development

Brawn GP emerged from Honda F1 after the Japanese decided to pull the plug on the team at the very last minute due to the global financial crisis. Ross Brawn, previously extremely successful with Ferrari, bought the team and replaced the Honda with a Mercedes engine. This proved a masterstroke, as the power unit was the missing link in an excellent chassis. At the beginning of the season, Brawn GP thus surprised all its competitors. Yet after the seventh race, the results deteriorated: after all, the competitors continued to develop their own cars the right way, while Brawn's development stagnated.

In part, a comparison between Brawn GP and Aston Martin rings true. The team of Alonso and Lance Stroll also unexpectedly thrilled the paddock at the start of a season with top performances (although Red Bull Racing always proved a size too big). It remains to be seen which direction Aston Martin will take next: will it manage to keep competing for podium spots? Or will Mercedes and Ferrari catch up with the team, as Brawn GP was eventually overtaken during the successful 2009 season?

Talent gets to prove itself now

An interesting period awaits Aston Martin. During the spring break, the team has undoubtedly not been idle, just as Mercedes and Ferrari have not. The latter teams do have so much more experience in rapid and successful further development than Aston Martin has. Not surprisingly, owner Lawrence Stroll has therefore been snatching talent from the top teams in recent times, in order to have the people who know what it takes to consistently perform at a high level. In the coming weeks, it is up to them to show that they are worth their money.

Huge miracles should not be expected, as Aston Martin is and remains a team under construction. Only in '24 - that was originally the idea - did the team want to compete with the top teams. "We take every opportunity", says Fernando Alonso about Aston Martin's head start on its own schedule. "We need to learn and we need to grow as a team also maybe now off-track because we are racing against Red Bull, Mercedes, Ferrari, teams that are used to this kind of pace of development and things like that. And maybe we are just in a learning process."

Bonus for Alonso

How the F1 calendar is structured may have contributed to Aston Martin getting off to such a flying start. With fast-changing races in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Melbourne, it was difficult to implement upgrades. "From now on, maybe we see the level of the teams changing a little bit, race-by-race, depending on who brings an upgrade that is good enough. I don't know, for us, it's all happy days at the moment. We never expected to be on the podium, maybe even throughout the season and in three races we have three. So everything that comes now is a plus", said Alonso.