After a difficult start to the year, the former Racing Point team showed a significantly improved form in Monaco, where Sebastian Vettel was fifth and Lance Stroll eighth.
With the changes to the aerodynamics rules introduced for this year, the team lost much of the momentum it had built up at the end of last season.
It has brought regular updates to the car, including further ground revisions for Monaco, where Vettel posted his best qualifying position to date and his best race result of the year.
A double score thanks to strong strategies that brought both drivers up the rankings helped the team jump from seventh to fifth place in the constructors’ championship.
“It was very much credit,” Stroll told Motorsport.com. “A great weekend for both cars. The pace was there, the strategy was there, a well executed plan.
“We had a difficult start to the season, we were treated badly with the rule changes and we cut through the ground, which did a lot of damage to the low-rake cars. We and Mercedes both lost almost a second per lap against our competitors.
“So we try to fight back and never give up, and we keep putting parts in the car to try to get back to where we should be.
“I don’t think we can go back to last year’s performance, because then we would of course have to give up the focus on the 22-series car. It’s a fine balance. But we will fight to the end. “
Lance Stroll, Aston Martin AMR21
Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images
Stroll said the drop in performance at the beginning of the season did not negatively impact the high profile switch to the Aston Martin name.
“I don’t think it affected the rebranding and that excitement,” he said. “That was phenomenal. We see it through the commitment of the fans.
“But it’s disappointing when you put in all the hard work and cars are frozen from a homologation point of view and then you come to the first race and realize that they weren’t really frozen from a homologation point of view.
“Again, based on what everyone is aware of, the cut in the ground that really hurt the low-rake cars. That is of course extremely frustrating. “
Stroll says the team has put the controversy over how the flight rules changes came about and is instead focusing on providing new updates in 2021.
Aston Martin has introduced an updated floor and side pods over the course of the season to compensate for rule changes introduced earlier this year.
“We got that over with,” added Stroll. “We’re just working to reclaim as much as possible.
“We still have a few things to do. I don’t know exactly how much, to be honest. We are certainly not done getting anything into the car yet, but it clearly can’t be long.” “
