Formula 1 in Budapest: Will Fernando Alonso and Aston Martin turn things around?

How frustrated Fernando Alonso is at the moment can be clearly seen from his priorities. The 44-year-old said recently at the Belgian Grand Prix that his focus was on leaving the race track behind him as quickly as possible on Sunday in order to make himself comfortable on his couch in time for the final of the World Cup. He himself ended up in a miserable last place, but what he saw on television may have even made him feel confident about his own fate. Because if history has repeated itself, so to speak, it could happen again in a variation. Or not?

When the Spanish national football team became world champions in 2010, with one more player than the Netherlands and the only goal in extra time, the racing driver from Asturias won the following Grand Prix with Ferrari. And what was it like this summer? The Red won 1-0 against ten Argentinians and scored the one decisive goal in extra time. According to this sports astrological logic, the ambitious Alonso’s suffering could at least be alleviated in Budapest. How fitting that his team has planned an urgently needed makeover for this weekend – which will also determine whether Formula 1 retains one of its charismatics.

Alonso came in 2023 to steer Aston Martin to success. Instead, for him it’s now about finding a way out of the dark tunnel so as not to completely lose interest. In the overall ranking this season, only four drivers out of a total of 22 drivers are worse than him. Alonso only collected one point after ten races, as few as Aston Martin was able to scrape together as a team. Second to last ahead of newcomer Cadillac – that neither meets the demands of the two-time champion nor the ambitions of team boss Lawrence Stroll.

Everything should be better this season, with the AMR26 from the pen of the design genius and title subscriber Adrian Newey, who was poached by Red Bull, and the millions that Stroll is putting into this project, including a new wind tunnel and a state-of-the-art factory. The design of the car was praised, but it didn’t make it competitive. Instead of taking off, the first half of the season resembles a very expensive crash landing. It was so unexpected that Newey admitted to feeling helpless and took responsibility for the problems. He set the “courageous development direction” because there was no time to compare several concepts. All eyes are now on him when it comes to initiating the turnaround.

“I have no doubt that Adrian will sooner or later provide the best car in the field,” says Fernando Alonso

Aston Martin now wants to pull itself out of its misery with two steps: In Budapest, a virtually new car is going on the track, lighter, the chassis has been completely revised, as they said. They packed up the old chassis just to be safe. After the summer break, a new engine from Honda will be added to the changed aerodynamics in Zandvoort. With the current one, the cars are not only slow, they were downright undriveable. The vibrations caused by the overloaded engine were sometimes so strong that the hands and feet of drivers Alonso and Lance Stroll felt numb and Newey initially feared permanent damage to their nerves.

Yes, the Honda with whose engine Red Bull dominated and won several world championships with mastermind Newey. But at that time it was still with a different engine crew, which has changed significantly due to the once decided and then revised exit from Formula 1. Waiting so long to make adjustments while the other teams continually introduced upgrades was “a painful decision,” Newey recently explained, but one that couldn’t be implemented any other way given the scope.

To explain what will change from the race on the Hungaroring, Chief Trackside Officer Mike Krack and Honda’s Formula 1 chief engineer Shintaro Orihara sat at a table in the motorhome painted in Aston Martin Racing Green on Thursday. There are dozens of journalists around them, a sound angel from Netflix above them, the troubled racing team ultimately provides good story material. “We have to learn as quickly as possible,” said Krack. “We do this to race. We haven’t done that in the past races. And that’s exactly what we have to get back to.” Formula 1 is a complex sport anyway, and the battery regulations introduced this year don’t make it any easier. Krack urges patience and appropriate expectation management. The goal is to cross the finish line with both cars: “If we manage to fight for something, if we’re back in the game, racing again, then it’s been a good weekend.”

If Krack had listened to the press conference a few hours later, he would have breathed a sigh of relief at the statements of his driving force in the cockpit. He is confident that the team will solve all problems. “It takes time,” said Fernando Alonso. “But I have no doubt that Adrian will sooner or later provide the best car in the field.” Nothing will change in the approach anyway, Aston Martin is here to win races and titles. But that should still need more time – so he added a reminder just to be on the safe side. “I feel fresh, motivated, fast. But I also have to enjoy what I’m doing,” said Alonso. “I don’t feel the same adrenaline as I used to.”

A racing driver like him doesn’t doubt his ability, but he does doubt the material and rules. During his break from Formula 1, Alonso already learned that things are beautiful elsewhere in the world of motorsport and that he can be successful there. His contract officially expires at the end of the season. On Thursday, when asked about the future, he said succinctly: “I have a contract.” That could definitely be taken as a hint.