Aston Martin “scratches back” major loss of performance

Aston Martin F1 owner Lawrence Stroll thinks his team is unlikely to be as competitive during 2021 as it was last year.

This is due to the change in aero regulations that took them “almost a second,” says Stroll, and the focus that needs to be placed on developing the car for the next year.

In their final year as Racing Point, Stroll’s team won the Sakhir Grand Prix through Sergio Perez and finished fourth in the Constructors’ Championship – it would have been third had it not been for 15 points taken off as part of a rule violation penalty.

But this season they have fallen behind from what is currently a head-to-head battle for P3 between McLaren and Ferrari, despite the fact that the team gave some “green instincts” from the team at the British racing green at the Monaco Grand Prix.

Both cars finished the points, with Sebastian Vettel finishing fifth in what is by far his strongest race for the team since joining, while the team owner’s son, Lance Stroll, finished eighth.

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“It was very commendable,” Stroll Sr. told Motorsport.com. “A great weekend for both cars. There was pace, strategy was there, a well executed plan.

“We had a difficult start to the season. We had a bad hand with rule changes when we cut the ground, which really hurt the low-rake cars. We and Mercedes both lost almost a second per lap against our rivals.

“So we try to work our way 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 obviously have to give up the focus on the 2022 car. It’s a good balance. But we will fight to the end. “

At this point, for the first time since 1960, it can be seen as a disappointing return to F1 for Aston Martin as a designer, but off the track, Stroll is anything but under-challenged.

“I don’t think it hurt the rebrand and the excitement,” he said. “That was phenomenal. We see it through fan engagement.

“But it’s disappointing when you put in all the hard work and cars are frozen from a homologation point of view. Then you come to the first race and notice that from a homologation point of view, they are not really frozen.

“We left that behind. We’re just working to scrape back as much as possible.

“We still have a few things to do. I don’t know exactly how much to be honest. We’re certainly not done getting anything to the car yet, but it clearly can’t be long. “

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