There are numerous factors that have played a part in the sudden catapulting of Aston Martin into a podium finisher this F1 season.
From a team that finished seventh in last year’s constructors’ championship, to suddenly possessing the second-quickest car on the grid has been eye-opening, to say the least, and has most definitely caught the likes of Mercedes, Ferrari, and Alpine by surprise.
Make no mistake, Fernando Alonso’s back-to-back third places in the opening two races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia were no fluke.
Crucially for Aston Martin, Alonso’s performances, and those of team-mate Lance Stroll to a lesser extent as he continues to recover from injuries sustained in a pre-season cycling accident that included a double wrist break, were on very different tracks.
The Bahrain International Circuit is a mix of low- and high-speed corners, and with an abrasive asphalt that quickly degraded the tyres on many cars. In contrast, the Jeddah Corniche Circuit is high-speed, and with a smooth surface.
In the space of two weekends, Aston Martin had shown its AMR23 is a car for all venues this season, and that it can expect many more podiums to come.
Aston recruits, recruits, and recruits again
There is now a cast of 800 overseeing the project, a steep rise from the 450 in the days when the team was latterly known as Racing Point, its interim moniker following owner Lawrence Stroll’s takeover of Force India.
Stroll’s backing, and that of his consortium, has naturally been instrumental in turning a team that so often punched above its weight into one that is becoming the powerhouse he had planned for when he took up the reins.
The billionaire businessman has put his money where his mouth is, putting in place the infrastructure required for the building of a new factory, wind tunnel and simulator, all of which are still under construction but are soon due to play their part in the ongoing transformation of the Silverstone-based organisation.
Stroll has also set about recruiting some of the best talents in the industry, notably Dan Fallows from Red Bull, formerly that team’s chief engineer of aerodynamics for eight years, and now Aston Martin’s technical director.
Additionally, Eric Blandin from Mercedes where the Frenchman was chief aerodynamicist for almost five years before making the switch and now working as Fallows’ deputy.
The duo took up the development of this season’s car from Andrew Green, the team’s long-time technical chief but who stepped back earlier this year to take on a role overseeing the company’s technology business.
Explaining what Fallows and Blandin have brought to the party, speaking to a select group of media, including Speedcafe, Aston Martin performance director Tom McCullough said: “This year’s car, throughout last year, was very much under Andrew Green’s leadership.
“He got Dan and Eric up to speed from a performance development and aero development side of things, and they’ve largely been very happy with what they’ve seen – the tools, the people.
“We were onto a path even before those guys turned up, but they’ve just brought another level of experience and knowledge from two of the best teams – Mercedes and Red Bull.
“They were there a long time and they have brought a lot of understanding and experience from there, and that’s just how it has evolved, how we work, that relentless push.”
Aston Martin doing things their way
In the wake of Alonso’s third place in Bahrain, the comments aired by senior figures from Red Bull – team principal Christian Horner, advisor Helmut Marko, even driver Sergio Perez – were unkind.
Marko went so far as to suggest that it was nice to see three Red Bulls on the podium, whilst Horner, in referencing last season’s RB18, said it was “good to see the old car going so well”.
The inference with such a remark was that the AMR23 was virtually a copy of a car that last year won 17 of 22 grands prix.
There are, however, considerable differences between the two cars, with McCullough adamant that despite Fallows’ former allegiance to Red Bull, and in working alongside renowned designer Adrian Newey, such remarks from Red Bull are just “white noise”.
“Both of them when they came, one from Red Bull, one from Mercedes, were very much of the opinion – and Dan said it first – that we want to do things the Aston Martin way,” said McCullough.
“That means listening to everything, to all the people internally, getting the input from two different ways of developing a car, and then looking at where we need to improve and looking at what we think is the best way of doing that.
“So that’s one thing that Dan’s been very good at doing, just saying that you always look at what other people are doing but you’ve got to do things your own way if you want to try and beat them.
“That’s very much been Dan and Eric’s sort of mantra from the beginning, from an aerodynamic and a concept side of things, so that’s the reality and why the cars do look quite different.”
Aston Martin now ‘fun and easy’
Fallows and Blandin have not only brought fresh ideas to the table, to a team it could be argued had stagnated to a degree given its former constraints but has now been unleashed under Stroll’s command.
But in tandem with the additional variety of personnel that has been brought on board over the last 18 months or so, they have instilled freedom of working, creativity, and design, that again had been confined by its own previous limitations.
“A lot of it is about creating that atmosphere, to give that creative thinking, which Dan and Eric have been very keen to do from the beginning,” remarked McCullough.
“They’ve been quite happy with the ideas and the information that have come from even existing people, and been really happy with the level of what they’ve had to work with, so I think that’s been good.
“But then that leadership, that direction, that competitiveness, and that drive is what Eric and Dan have really brought to the party.
“Last year, we started a certain way. We had developed two ways, we’d gone a certain way and it wasn’t the right way. We accepted that, we changed that.
“They then arrived during that process, and they agreed and then took hold of that and sort of rounded it.
“I think the working relationship between Dan, Eric and Andrew Green last year, plus the other senior people has been really strong.
“We were all disappointed last year when we weren’t fast enough at the start.
“Eric and Dan, as well as being very competent, very good people, they’re really decent human beings, they really want this project to work.
“So it’s actually really easy and fun to work with them.”
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