Honda identify crucial Aston Martin weakness before Canadian GP weekend

Before the Australian GP, Adrian Newey revealed the state that the AMR26 was in. After the pre-season tests in Barcelona and Bahrain, Aston Martin drivers Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso believed the car was undrivable.

Newey said, “The much more significant problem with that is that that vibration is transmitted ultimately into the driver's fingers. So, Fernando is of the feeling that he can't do more than 25 laps consecutively before he will risk permanent nerve damage to his hands. Lance is of the opinion that he can't do more than 15 laps before that threshold.”

That weekend, neither driver had a classified finish, with Stroll being 15 laps down and Alonso not finishing at all. At the Chinese GP, it was a double DNF. However, at the Japanese GP, Alonso managed to finish the race, making it Aston Martin's first race finish of the season.

Slowly but surely, the team has been improving. Using the five-week break between the Japanese and Miami Grands Prix, the Silverstone-based team managed to improve. The team had their first double finish of the season.

Unlike several other teams, Aston Martin did not bring upgrades to Miami, and it is understood that they will not bring upgrades to the Canadian GP.

Speaking after the race in Miami, Alonso said, “The team explained to me that if we bring one or two tenths every race, it doesn’t change our position, we are P20 or P19, and the next car is one second in front."

“So, even if we bring two tenths every race, it doesn’t change our position, and it’s a huge stress in the system, in the budget cap and things like that. Until we don’t have a one-and-a-half or two-second improvement, it’s better not to press the button in production because we waste money.”

In its Canadian GP preview, Honda trackside chief engineer Shintaro Orihana said, “At the Miami Grand Prix, we confirmed our battery vibration improvements and our overall power unit reliability. It was also a key opportunity to learn on the energy management side under the updated 2026 regulations, and this will continue in Canada.”

He added, “In fact, this is an important target of our race weekend. If we can give more confidence to the drivers in entering the corners faster and carrying more speed, then we unlock lap time.”

One benefit of running behind the competition is that Aston Martin could gain more development opportunities. Engine suppliers that are behind on development may qualify for Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities (ADUO). The first checkpoint for ADUO is set to take place after the Canadian GP, following the announcement that the timeline would be moved.

Instead of happening after the sixth, twelfth, and eighteenth races of the season, the checkpoints will now happen after the Canadian GP (fifth race), Hungarian GP (11th race), and the Mexico City GP (18th race). If Honda is found to be lagging by more than 2%, it could receive at least 70 additional development hours.