Aston Martin is fifth in the F1 2024 pecking order so far, both in terms of race performance and results, heading to Miami 12 points behind fourth-placed Mercedes.
But even though the team struggled to match Ferrari and McLaren over a race distance, the Silverstone team’s performance in qualifying bucked that trend.
In the hands of two-time world champion Fernando Alonso, Aston’s AMR24 qualified on the second or third row of the grid four out of five times, only to fall back a race distance.
Alonso said he saw his car’s surprising one-lap performance as a bonus rather than a sign that something was wrong with his pace on the long runs in China, saying his team “can’t excuse me for being too fast in qualifying, so let’s take it.”
According to the team’s performance director, Tom McCullough, the continued gap between qualifying and race pace is a key point to resolve, with the team fully focused on getting their car into the race. best possible window for Sunday.
“Every race we’ve had the same pattern. The margins in qualifying are very, very small between several teams, more than just the top five teams,” McCullough said.
“Getting the most out of the car, the tires, the understanding, that’s definitely the strength of our car this year and then in the race.
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
“We’re trying everything on our side to prepare the car as well as possible for the race. We’re not trying to just prepare for qualifying and ignore the race.”
“The development of the car, the whole understanding of how to optimize the car and the tires is focused on that. Some teams have done a better job than us at the moment and we have to continue to work hard on that. “
McCullough added that rather than a deliberate strategy, the better one-lap performance is the by-product of some of the changes made to the car, such as a more efficient DRS system. Changes which were mainly aimed at achieving a more efficient car in racing version.
“During the development phase, you have key decisions to make,” he explained.
“Points are always awarded on Sunday, we don’t develop a car for qualifying. There are certain elements that need to be strong when you develop a car.
“The effectiveness of the DRS switch will also help in qualifying and qualifying is important. If you can get into the open air and run your own race then you are much better than being in dirty air and losing a lot of points of support.
“A lot of decisions we made throughout last year and regarding this year’s car helped qualifying a little bit, but our main goal in how we develop the car is to be a race car fast.”
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