Despite the red flag! Adrian Newey calls the XXL upgrade ‘promising’

With the completely revamped Aston Martin, things weren’t quite going as hoped in Budapest, at least as of Friday lunchtime. In FP1, Lance Stroll caused a red flag whilst testing the new package: his Aston Martin suddenly locked up, spun round and came to a halt. The session was red-flagged. Stroll had to get out, and the car was towed away.

Investigations into the cause are ongoing

Aston Martin’s team principal, Adrian Newey, said just over an hour after the end of the session: “We’re all working flat out to understand what happened. But we can’t comment on it until we’ve understood it.” So the investigations are ongoing – but a solution should be in place by the second practice session.

“Quite unexpected”

Work had been carried out on the affected area of the rear suspension prior to the session. Newey made it clear, however: “The area that was affected hadn’t actually undergone major changes. There were only minimal adjustments in that area. So this was quite unexpected.”

Speaking generally about the upgrade, Newey said: “It’s a further development. The chassis, layout and front suspension have remained the same. It’s more of an aerodynamic development. We had little time for research in February (during the shakedown, ed.). It’s now a sort of step back to understand things and then take a step forward with this package.”

Initial results promising

He emphasises: “It’s still very early days in terms of understanding.” However, the Briton cautiously notes: “The initial results are promising.” And: “Will this make us the fastest car? Unfortunately not. Does it represent progress compared to where we were? I think it does.”

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Newey also cautioned, however: “We don’t have many parts, so we’re being cautious and trying to learn as much as possible.” In any case, that didn’t go entirely to plan in FP1. New developments are also being produced in smaller quantities for cost reasons. Accordingly, further incidents should ideally be avoided – otherwise the spare parts drawer could suddenly be empty.

Design legend Newey spoke almost philosophically about the major crisis of 2026 and winning and losing in general: “When you’re not winning, it seems like an insurmountable mountain. But when you win, you sometimes don’t know how you got there, because you’re not actually doing anything differently.”