Aston Martin have shared footage to social media of Fernando Alonso meeting the team and having a seat fitting during his first day at the headquarters. Following this, eagle-eyed fans have been trying to spot aspects of the upcoming 2023 car.
The team posted to Twitter:
“First day in green. Earlier this week,@alo_oficial made his debut at AMF1 HQ – meeting the team, spending time in the sim and having a seat fit.”
One Twitter user in particular, Craig Scarborough, has been doing a deep dive into some pf the parts of the car we can just make out from the video, posting a number of stills to help us on the journey. Scarborough picks out the square topped shape of the roll hoop, which he believes suggests a “more centreline cooling” system.
“First looks at the AMR23. Some key changes are apparent. First off the roll takes a very square topped shape, suggesting more centreline cooling. At this bare stage, [it’s] easy to see the actual ‘V’ of the hoop inside the inlet.” [sic]
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The roll hoop acts as a safety feature of the car, with it being necessary for it to hold the weight of the car in the scenario it flips. As we saw during the British Grand Prix where Zhou Guanyu flipped on the first corner, these are incredibly important and for the 2023 season, have had more stringent regulations put on them.
This part of the car also acts as an air intake and cooling for the engine and its radiators.
Scarborough went on to comment on the sidepod design, which he believes is different to the 2022 car.
“There also something going on with the sidepod inlet. Not quite RedBull-ish in shape, but with an upper surface shorter than the lower surface. Plus something in front of it, may be mirror/mounting seen bottom left as a gray 3d printed objects.” [sic]
There’s not a lot to go on with these incredibly blurry photos, but we’re slowly getting more of an idea of what their car will look like for testing. The car will be revealed February 13.
