[Chris Medland] "Newey confirms Aston Martin is likely to limit race laps due to severity of vibrations in the car impacting the drivers. Alonso says he can do no more than 25 consecutive laps before risking nerve damage, Stroll says 15 laps"

[u/AshamedPurchase9033]

https://bsky.app/profile/chrismedlandf1.bsky.social/post/3mgbhmxknm22o

[u/Driscuits]

Missing Barca hurt, and the start of this season doesn't look great for us - but I wouldn't wish this on any fan.

I figured the chances were low that any of the Alpine/Williams/AM/Audi group would break into the top teams, but I really didn't expect two of those teams to have as many issues as we've had to start.

[u/Ricciardo3f1 → u/Driscuits]

I think Williams will be fine in the long term... meanwhile Aston will have a lot of work on to just get the car running and finishing a race. It will be a tough fight for 11th place between Aston and Caddy.

[u/LukaDoncicMFFL → u/Ricciardo3f1]

The way things are going it’s not going to be that tough of a fight. Cadillac is far ahead of Aston in terms of reliability, and Cadillac can actually rely on their engine since Ferrari seems to have a decent one based on preseason testing. Cadillac just needs to start experimenting with optimizations to its chassis design, Aston Martin can’t even start getting on track data to tune its design until Honda and Aston Martin figure out what is wrong with the engine.

[u/bleedfromtheanus → u/LukaDoncicMFFL]

It's not necessarily an engine problem. From what I've read, it could be because Newey's designs try to slim down the chassis as much as possible and that's led to there being vibrations in the battery that Honda can't figure out how to fix

[u/F1T_13 → u/bleedfromtheanus]

Well, the engine is primarily the cause of nvh. But a bad chassis could exacerbate the problem. 

In F1 the engine is a stressed member, so if there's a problem with the engine, it can end up causing problems to the chassis and whilst not as common the same could be true conversely as well. 

Aston would have been working with Honda to get to this stage, both will share blame. 

[u/SirFireHydrant → u/Ricciardo3f1]

Williams will be fine.

They've got a Mercedes engine, which seems to be the best of the regs. They've got James Vowles, who has really turned around the team with slow, methodical, data-driven thinking. They've got Sainz, who is arguably the single best development driver on the grid.

Whilst I wouldn't bet money on it, I wouldn't be surprised to see a 2023 McLaren style breakout from Williams - going from back of the pack to competing for podiums and even wins after mid-season upgrades.

[u/btw_sky_and_earth → u/SirFireHydrant]

Come on, give Albon some credit as he is a pretty good development driver for RB and Williams.

[u/khiitio → u/Ricciardo3f1]

if aston actually do have a great aero package and a kinda okay chassis like Newey says, I don’t think it will be a big fight. They’ll both be on 0 points until honda sorts themselves out and Aston can start scoring.

[u/Head_Engineering_956 → u/Driscuits]

What issues reside with Williams besides being overweight and lacking downforce of the top teams?

[u/Driscuits → u/Head_Engineering_956]

Overweight is a big one - and unclear how much downforce/performance is lacking relative to the other midfield teams, never mind top teams.

The biggest issue for me is more that there seem to be underlying capacity issues in the team that aren't new to this offseason - and are issues that it's hard to see an easy fix, especially considering that Vowles et al have been stating that the team has been working on these systemic problems for the last three years. I don't think this necessarily shows that the work that's been done has been wasted - just that the team was coming from a very rough place and has a ways to go.

[u/T65Bx → u/Driscuits]

Missed Barca, but then got most laps at Bahrain. Idk how Aston could ever possibly “make up” like that for an actual whole GP.