Aston Martin’s performance in the 2023 Formula 1 season is no coincidence, but “definitely” real. That says Mike Krack as team boss. Because after three podium finishes in three races so far, he can say with satisfaction that his racing team was “competitive everywhere”. “And that gives us confidence that the same will be the case elsewhere,” says Krack.
But he warns against too much euphoria about Aston Martin: “We are dealing with very different tracks, with long straights in Baku or with Monaco with almost no straights. All these factors will shift the balance of power back and forth. That’s why I always say : We have to be careful about drawing too many conclusions from just one event.”
The race in Australia, for example, was distorted by the various red phases and restarts. A trend cannot necessarily be derived from this. “We just have to wait a few more races for that,” says Krack. “It takes a little more data to build an understanding. And the data says it’s very close.”
Aston Martin in Australia behind Mercedes
And where Aston Martin was the second force behind Red Bull at the opener in Bahrain, Krack’s team seemed to have only the third fastest car in Australia, behind Mercedes. In any case, Lance Stroll had the impression that Aston Martin was “not as fast” as in the previous Grands Prix. “At least we weren’t any better than our opponents.”
That’s why, Fernando Alonso believes, qualifying will be “pretty important” in the upcoming races, precisely because the teams behind Red Bull have moved closer together. “The pace over the race distance,” says Alonso, is now very similar.” In fact, Mercedes, Aston Martin and Ferrari were partly on the same level in Australia.
Development race decides further form
Alonso therefore expects “interesting weeks” in Formula 1. “The question is: which team develops better? In the first three races outside of Europe, it is still difficult to use updates. But from now on, the level of the teams of races should improve change a bit to races, depending on who has new parts and if they’re good enough,” he explains.
Aston Martin, however, cannot lose in this competition because the team is already “satisfied” with its 2023 season. “We never expected to be on the podium, maybe not even throughout the season. And now we have three Podiums after three races.”
“Anything that comes next is a plus,” says Alonso. “We’re just taking everything we can get and we’re still learning as a team, even off the track. Because now we’re fighting with Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari, teams that are used to development races like this. That’s why we’re going in 2023 very humbly.”
Increased demands at Stroll and Aston Martin
On the other hand, with the better performance on the racetrack, your own demands also increase. Stroll, who has often followed with Aston Martin over the past year, now says: “When the car is better you want to achieve more and that is exactly the goal now. We are fighting for good positions with a car that feels good .”
“That’s the sport when you have a car that can drive on the podium and in the top 5. Last year we were satisfied with eighth or ninth places. That’s not very satisfying this year.”
A comparison with the 2022 pre-season shows how different Aston Martin’s starting position is: With 65 points, the team around Alonso and Stroll scored a full ten points more after just three races of the season than in the entire past year over 22 races.
