Mike Krack says Aston Martin is not lost with their current and next year’s F1 car amid results dip and rumour brigade.
What started off on a solid note for Aston Martin in F1 2023 is going downhill at a fast rate where they have even lost fourth to McLaren. Fortunately, they have a good gap between them and Alpine which will at least help them retain fifth by the end of it.
It is still an improvement from last year but how they started off the 2023 season, it is quite the drop. Their latest update package in Austin hasn’t been cracked as they have been switching between the Qatar spec both in US GP and also Mexico GP.
Team boss Krack insists that Aston Martin isn’t lost with its development plan but it is more the case of learning and understanding the updates. They have some from Austin and they will get more after the Mexico running. They don’t have a bug in the system.
As of now they are keeping unison even though it is always a tough ask to switch between specs which could lead to undermining of any engineer’s work. There is disappointment within Aston Martin certainly including Lawrence but they are pushing on.
Lost with development and updates –
Krack: “I can get this impression. And I was expecting that question also. But I think when you are lost, you’re rolling the dice, then you try things that are not reasonable. And this was not the case. I mean, we have quite focused engineering discussions, weighing options against each other. And while we want to go racing, we want not to go from pitlane, it is very important that we understand the findings that we have in the data, and then we have to take such pragmatic decisions also sometimes, as I said, it’s not easy, but I think it’s the right way to move forward.”
Not sure to use the updates, isn’t it is being lost –
Krack: “You like to push us into this being lost direction. You asked me already for the second time, I can tell you honestly, we are not. We are analysing our data. And we try to take the correct solutions from it. You have to understand that have very different circuits you have. You could see, for example, until FP3, there were teams on the back foot that you would not have expected there, and vice versa. Coming from Austin to here, it’s not that straightforward, a car that works in Austin, you just put it on the track here, and everything works. So we have seen the Alpines struggling qualifying, we have seen the Ferrari struggling up until FP3. And we had other cars that were very far in front. And then we’re more at the back. So it’s not an easy task to understand everything, how the track evolves, how the conditions are changing when you bring upgrade, and this is taking time and analysis. And I think it’s important that at the end of the weekend, you do a proper analysis, and you move on.”
Limitation in understanding –
Krack: “The cars are complex, and you try to improve them all the time. And then when you bring upgrades, we know the issues we had in Austin, we don’t have to go through them again. But then in the race, I think we were quite happy with how it went. And everything was also working the way we expected it to work. But then you come here, and you are not where you think you should be, or the car does not do what you what you expect it to do. And it’s something that you need to find out, because there will be other tracks with more low speed or different characteristics. So it’s important that you understand what you’re doing. And the best solution to understand what you’re doing is when you revert to something that you know, comparing to something that you know, and I think that is always, from an engineering point of view, the best approach.”
Bug in development system –
Krack: “We don’t have a bug in the system. We have an engineering exercise here that you pair with a sporting competition, it’s as simple as that. So we analyse our data, we try to understand which areas where we have weaknesses in, and try to improve them. I would not say there’s a bug.”
Going to old spec and convincing engineers –
Krack: “No, we are really a great team for that, we are open-minded, people are working together very, very well. Back in mission control back in all the areas that analyse data, and we remained with facts, there is there is nobody that is proud, pride is not in the way. Don’t worry.”
Disappointment within team and Lawrence Stroll –
Krack: “Lawrence is not happy. But we are not happy either. Nobody is happy. When you have such a great start of the season. And then you lose competitiveness, nobody is happy. But we do not need him to tell us. We have also to accept that he’s not. So I think it’s a situation that we are in. As I said, we are strong team, and we will have to work collaboratively open-minded, to get out of it. But as I said before, we’re not too proud to do any decisions.”
Here’s Lance Stroll and Valtteri Bottas on collision
Here’s link to a F1 Discord channel, join in to interact
