Aston Martin’s struggle to beat Williams and Haas is unacceptable

Fernando Alonso has lamented Aston Martin’s position in the Formula 1 pecking order as the team struggles to maintain an upper hand over its midfield rivals.

The Silverstone-based team was the fifth-fastest team in the early part of the season, but the AMR24’s improvements have so far failed to deliver the expected performance gains.

While at least one Aston driver reached Q3 in each of the first seven qualifying sessions of the season (including sprint qualifying), this happened just five times in the subsequent 12 sessions – Alonso and team-mate Lance Stroll qualified 11th and 17th for last weekend’s Italian Grand Prix.

As for Sunday’s results, Aston scored 42 points in the first six rounds, 26 in the next six rounds and just six in the last four.

Although the top four teams were again out of reach, two-time F1 world champion Alonso finished just outside the points in Italy, two-tenths of a second behind the penalised Kevin Magnussen and just over a second behind ninth-placed Alex Albon. He admits to feeling somewhat helpless in his attempts to get the best out of a midfield car.

“We can’t do anything about it, we’re at the mercy of our team and I think Lance and I are doing our best every weekend,” said Alonso.

Valtteri Bottas, Stake F1 Team KICK Sauber C44 battles with Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin AMR24 out of the pit lane

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

“One inspired weekend, like this weekend from my side, I know it will be ‘the completely anonymous Monza 2024 of Alonso’.

“But I think this year – Lance and I – we’ve been very close, and (in Monza) it was one of those weekends where I was a bit better and I was happy with the car and pushed to a level that was maybe above 100% and that was P11, so I was disappointed with that.

“We have to be patient. We have to understand that the big target is 2026. But at the same time I think as a team we can accept that we are not fighting in the top four – they are top teams and they are far ahead of us. But now that we are behind Williams, behind Haas, behind (RB), I think we have to raise the bar a bit. We have to get better.”

He added of his Italian Grand Prix: “We were lucky with the start – a very good start, we overtook Nico (Hulkenberg) and then we were running tenth, close to Alex.

“We were able to keep up the pace surprisingly well with Williams, which we were very happy with. But then we got ahead of him, which meant we were in ninth place for most of the race (less than 10 laps actually).

“We chose two stops – we couldn’t do it with one because of our tyre wear. It’s very painful to lose the points because I think we deserve it in a way, with a well-executed race. But the car is what it is at the moment, and we have to get better.”

Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin AMR24, leads Daniel Ricciardo, VCARB 01

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Alonso does not expect Aston’s performance to improve significantly in the near future, but he is eagerly awaiting the next updates to the AMR24.

“(Until) we have an upgrade on the car, this is what it is and this is not good enough,” he insisted. “Not good enough in Monza. Not good enough in Zandvoort, in Spa, in Hungary.

“So I don’t think there will be a big change in Baku, Singapore or Austin unless we bring new parts. That’s the plan.”