Aston Martin braced for one more weekend of pain in F1 Belgian GP

Aston Martin is counting the days until next week's arrival of its long-awaited B-spec Formula 1 car in Hungary. But before it heads to Budapest, the beleaguered Silverstone squad is having to grind through its toughest weekend yet at high-speed Spa-Francorchamps.

Having been well off the pace with both its car and its Honda power unit from day one, both parties have banked on saving their upgrades until they are significant enough to make a difference to their fortunes, with there being no point in spending resources on a smaller package that would still leave the AMR26 as the slowest team on the grid.

Friday practice in Hungary will reveal if there is light at the end of a very long tunnel for Aston Martin in 2026, introducing what amounts to a B-spec car replete with aerodynamic upgrades which it has developed in recent months.

But before it can tap into that performance boost, which it hopes can change the trajectory of the season or at least give it a solid direction for 2027, Aston will have to endure one more weekend of hopeless pain at what may turn out to be its worst circuit on the calendar. With its fast corners, long straights and little opportunities to harvest energy, there has been no place to hide for either Aston or Honda as their relative weaknesses were brutally exposed.

Friday practice painted a particularly painful picture, with leading Aston driver Lance Stroll's 1m51.131s lap over five seconds behind pacesetter Kimi Antonelli, and Fernando Alonso a further three tenths behind. It effectively pitted the team halfway between the benchmark in F1 - 1m45.944s - and the fastest lap in F2 qualifying, Rafael Camara's 1m56.306s.

Aston's trackside engineering chief Mike Krack said the team was expecting Spa to be as poor as it is. "I think it is in line with expectation," he said after Friday practice. "We knew this track was going to be probably the hardest of all.

"We need to be realistic. You know we're quite far off. The positions you gain are from attrition but there's nothing to fight for in terms of result. I think it would be quite naive to think you can do something like that. For that we are too far off."

Lance Stroll, Aston Martin Racing

But Krack insisted everything the team does now to optimise its trackside operations, while seemingly futile with the car at its disposal right now, will stand it in good stead when it does have a more competitive package.

"We did not get demotivated by that," he said. "We need to do our homework and wait for the time when you have a quicker car.

"Our people have done a good job trying to optimise it as much as we can. It's little steps that when you have a quicker car, they are more rewarding than now in terms of position but, as I said, you still have to be on it for the day we have a quicker car.

"We still have two cars. We try to do our best, try to execute well, and make the right decisions."

Speaking earlier this weekend, Krack praised his team and engine partner Honda with how it has dealt with adversity this year and felt it had people who worked as hard as - if not harder than - any other team on the grid to turn their fortunes around.

"Credit to all the team, especially the trackside people, for how they have coped with it, including HRC," he added. "We went through a tough time. We sat together and we spoke about this. Because everybody has good days, everybody has bad days. So, we need to help each other when these situations occur. And I think from the people and human side, we handled this very well."

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