Within the days earlier than the Miami Grand Prix, Aston Martin driver Fernando Alonso sat down with the media, together with SB Nation, and talked about legendary engineer Adrian Newey and the staff’s plans for the 2026 season.
Now, Newey’s imaginative and prescient could also be coming to life.
Aston Martin launched an intensive interview with the residing legend, who joined the staff this spring as its new Managing Technical Associate. Within the wide-ranging interview, Newey provided his newest ideas on the incoming technical laws, that are set to shake up Components 1 subsequent season.
Whereas earlier within the 12 months it appeared Newey was elevating a crimson flag concerning the incoming laws, now it seems he has a imaginative and prescient for methods to proceed heading into the brand new period.
“My ideas on the ‘26 laws are just like what my ideas had been concerning the massive regulation change for 2022: initially considering the laws had been so prescriptive that there wasn’t a lot left right here [for a designer], however then you definitely begin to drill into the element and realise there’s extra flexibility for innovation and completely different approaches than first meets the attention,” started Newey when requested concerning the incoming laws.
Newey then went on to foretell that 2026 would possibly look lots like 2022, when groups introduced drastically completely different ideas to the observe. Chief amongst these, in fact, was the notorious “zero-pod” idea that Mercedes carried out that season.
“We noticed that in the beginning of 2022, with groups taking actually fairly completely different instructions. Now, in fact, 4 seasons on, they’ve largely converged, however initially that wasn’t the case. Variation between groups is nice. It’s all a bit boring if the automobiles look equivalent and the one manner you may inform them aside is the livery,” stated Newey.
“I feel there’s a excessive chance that in ‘26 we’ll see one thing just like ‘22. There’s sufficient flexibility within the laws, and I’m positive individuals will provide you with completely different options. A few of these can be dropped over the primary two or three years as groups begin to converge.”
Newey additionally pointed to the truth that not solely are the chassis laws altering, however so too are the energy unit laws. Beneath the incoming laws, there can be a 50/50 cut up between the ability offered by the inner combustion engine and the battery element.
The engineer believes this additionally creates elevated “alternatives” for groups, just like when hybrid energy models had been first launched in 2014.
“The opposite facet of that is that, for the primary time I can keep in mind, we’ve acquired each the chassis laws and energy unit laws altering on the similar time. That is… attention-grabbing… and barely scary. Each the brand new aerodynamic guidelines and the PU [power unit] laws current alternatives. I might count on to see a spread of aero options, and there may very well be variation in PU efficiency throughout the grid to start with – which is what occurred when the hybrid laws first got here in, in 2014.”
Newey becoming a member of the staff and specializing in the upcoming set of laws could also be precisely what Aston Martin wants to start out the brand new period of F1 on the entrance foot. Along with the transfer to Honda energy models, now Aston Martin has Newey within the fold — together with his admitted love of taking up the problem of recent laws.
It might make for the perfect pairing.
“I do take pleasure in regulation modifications,” Newey is quoted as saying in The Components. “Maybe the a part of my job I take pleasure in probably the most is determining what these laws imply, what’s their intention, and if a delicate distinction permits [us to explore] new horizons.”
All through his legendary profession, Newey has usually solved these riddles effectively, doing so with pencil and paper alongside together with his legendary pocket book, slightly than the computer-guided design applications which can be all the craze today.
Take the RB5, his design at Purple Bull for the 2009 season. That 12 months introduced sweeping new laws geared toward bettering overtaking, which included modifications to the bodywork, the tires, and the introduction of the “kinetic vitality restoration system,” or KERS. That design powered Purple Bull to a second-place end within the Constructors’ Championship, their finest end result but within the sport. Solely a extra artistic design, the “double diffuser” utilized by Brawn GP on their BGP 001, prevented Purple Bull from successful their first title.
However they achieved that the next 12 months with Newey’s RB6, which was basically the RB5 with a double diffuser of its personal. Newey believed that automotive generated probably the most downforce within the sport’s historical past. “The RB6 was in all probability the automotive with probably the most downforce within the historical past of F1, extra even than the legendary spoiler automobiles of the Nineteen Eighties,” stated Newey years later. “We measured as much as 5.5G of lateral acceleration. It might go flat out by means of Copse at Silverstone.”
Newey spoke of his “belief” in Honda throughout his dialogue with Aston Martin.
“Subsequent 12 months marks the beginning of our works partnership with Honda. I’ve acquired lots of belief in Honda and an enormous quantity of respect for them, having labored with them earlier than,” added Newey. “They took a 12 months out of F1 and so, to some extent, they’re taking part in catch-up, however they’re an ideal group of engineers and really a lot an engineering-led firm.”
Whereas Newey’s imaginative and prescient could also be coming collectively for the staff’s 2026 challenger, the legendary engineer was reluctant to make any form of predictions for subsequent 12 months.
“There’s no level in daydreaming concerning the future. It’s about getting on and doing the work. If we do our work appropriately, hopefully issues will come collectively.”