First Newey-designed Aston Martin emerges at testing

The first Aston Martin to be designed under the leadership of eminent designer Adrian Newey has appeared in pre-season testing.

The car’s debut had been delayed – although the team have not explained why – but Aston Martin managed to get the AMR26 out for the final hour of running at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on Thursday.

Lance Stroll managed only four slow laps before stopping on track, with Aston Martin saying the move was “precautionary”.

However, the car’s design has already caught attention.

Running in an all-black camouflage livery, its nose, side pods and engine cover were clearly different from those that had appeared on most cars so far.

The test is being held in private and no independent media are permitted.

But from the few photographs Aston Martin have published, the nose appears wider than the norm on cars designed to the new 2026 rules – with a shape perhaps reminiscent of a duck’s bill.

The side pods are very thin and heavily undercut, the front suspension mounting points are very high on the chassis and the engine cover is heavily cut away.

The car only arrived in Spain on Wednesday and the team spent most of the day preparing it.

Stroll said: “It was a long day for all the mechanics and everyone in the team pushing flat out to get the car ready.

“We got a few laps in at the end of the day and it was feeling good. We have to learn the car and understand its strengths and weaknesses.”

Lead driver Fernando Alonso is due in the car on Friday – the fifth and final day of this week’s testing.

Newey’s cars have won 14 drivers’ championships and 12 constructors’ titles since 1991 across the Williams, McLaren and Red Bull teams.

He joined Aston Martin in March last year and has been working on the new 2026 car ever since.

Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren, Racing Bulls and Cadillac also ran on Thursday.

Lewis Hamilton had a spin in the Ferrari out of Turn 10, but he and team-mate Charles Leclerc managed 170 laps between them.

Seven-time champion Hamilton said: “Nice to get out in the dry. It was great to be able to understand the tyres… [and get] a bit of an understanding as to where the car is at.

“I did 85 laps in the morning, which is amazing. Last year we had a worse start to testing so considering this is a new set of rules it is better than in the past.

“Still continuing to get as much mileage and knowledge on this engine and the car on the aero side.”

At McLaren, Oscar Piastri managed 48 laps before his day was curtailed by a fuel-system problem.

Technical director performance Mark Temple said: “The car is very complex so we decided to bring it back and strip it down to understand where it was coming from.”

Mercedes again impressed, with George Russell and Kimi Antonelli setting the two fastest times and completing 168 laps between them on what was their last day of testing.

Teams are only allowed to run on three of the five days and Mercedes have reached their allocation.

Russell said: “A very positive test and we had a lot of mileage on the car, which was the main focus of the test.

“The car is feeling nice to drive, no major issues, no porpoising – which is pretty good news for all of us, it will save us a few years on the back. All in all a decent few days.”

Russell’s reference to porpoising concerns an aerodynamic phenomenon that blighted the cars from 2022-25. When airflow under the car is disrupted a high-speed bouncing can be set in motion.

The new cars have a different design philosophy so will not be affected by it.

“The car has been working well, but it is not about how well it works, it is about how quick it goes around the track and we don’t really have an indication of that at the moment,” he added.

“We are in a reasonably good place and I am sure things are going to change between now and the Bahrain test and I’m sure people are going to be bringing upgrades to the car.”

Red Bull are hoping to be back out on Friday. They were unable to run on Thursday because they were waiting for spare parts.

Lap times cannot be considered representative of performance at what has been dubbed a “shakedown” test, as teams do not reveal what programmes they are running and fuel load, engine modes and tyre compounds all make major differences to lap times.