Aston Martin is not having the best start to life this season. In the Saudi Arabian FP1, Lance Stroll could only manage P17 with Fernando Alonso in P14. They believe their AMR25 is still trailing behind the competition after another poor showing in FP2. Team Boss Andy Cowell is also unhappy with the car’s performance.
Stroll: “Not the most competitive day”
Stroll had an eventful Saudi Arabian FP2 when his rear brakes locked up. The Canadian skidded across the track and bringing out the yellow flag.
Stroll believes that his team is not where they want to be. He said they will spend the evening figuring out what went wrong.
“It was not the most competitive day for sure. We’ll see what we can work on tonight. [Then] improve for tomorrow, and go from there.“
“[It’s] just a big rear lock and I lost it. Yeah, it’s tricky out there for sure. Like I said, we’ll see what we can work on and improve for tomorrow.“
The 26-year-old believes they’re set for a tough Saudi Arabia GP qualifying session with the current Aston Martin state.
“It’s going to be a tough mission for sure. We didn’t look great today, but we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.“
Alonso: “Still a bit behind where we want to be.”
Alonso ended the Saudi Arabian Friday and learned that the team was still behind the competition. But he said they would be eager to crunch the data to get them the best possible package after FP2.
“I think we did some clean laps today, and the pace is still a little bit behind where we want it to be.“
“There are a couple of tests that we went through today. So let’s try to get the data also between the two cars and put the best package tomorrow. And hopefully get closer to that top 10 that is obviously the target.“
The veteran has good memories of Saudi Arabia. He took third in 2023 and fourth in 2024. Naturally, he will play those to his strengths despite the car’s limitations.
“It has been always very friendly to me in terms of results at Jeddah. I feel always comfortable here, as I said today, you know we may have the car in the right window.”
“We struggle with the front grip in the medium and high speed corners, which in Jeddah obviously it takes you a lot of confidence to attack the corners. And yeah, we need to regain that confidence into tomorrow.”
At one point, Alonso complained about the traffic on the track. He hopes for a clear and uncongested qualifying session.
“I mean it was difficult, it was unlucky on the first lap. But yeah, I had a second attempt and that one was clean so yeah let’s see tomorrow.”
“I think in qualifying, especially Q1, you have a little bit of traffic around and you need to be lucky.”
“But yeah, I think it’s much better managed normally in qualifying than practises, so yeah let’s hope for a clean qualy.“
