Fernando Alonso says Aston Martin AMR26 ‘impossible to drive’ after new gearbox issue

Fernando Alonso believes that Aston Martin and Honda have successfully eradicated the vibration issues that plagued the AMR26.

However, a new problem cropped up in qualifying relating to the gearbox. Alonso said it was “impossible to drive” in Miami Grand Prix qualifying, and would not be manageable for the race without a fix.

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Front locking appeared to be the main issue hampering Aston Martin in Miami, demonstrated when Alonso struggled to get the AMR26 slowed as he entered the pit lane at the end of Q1.

When asked by PlanetF1.com, following his Q1 exit, whether Aston Martin had generally been able to improve the front locking situation during the race weekend, Alonso replied: “Yeah, it’s bad.”

That was not the most pressing issue, however, according to Alonso.

“But I think the biggest problem for me, to be honest, in qualifying, was the gearbox,” he continued.

“It was for the very first time, because we didn’t have any problem the rest of the sessions this weekend. But now in quali, it was impossible to drive.

“I lost sync in every braking point, so I have no acceleration out of the corners, and the downshifts were all over the place, very random. Sometimes I had push, sometimes I had rear locking. So that was a surprise, bad surprise, in quali.

“So let’s try to understand and fix it for tomorrow, especially if it rains. I think we cannot race with this level of random downshifts that we have at the moment.”

The most discussed issue which Aston Martin has faced with a troublesome AMR26 has been the vibrations.

Positive news on that front. Alonso said the vibrations are “gone”.

An AMR26 remained with Honda after the Japanese Grand Prix, allowing the manufacturer to carry out tests at its Sakura base.

“17th place is one second in front of us, so still a long way to go,” Alonso added.

“But yeah, the reliability and the vibrations, they are much better than what it has been so far. So that’s the main positive of this weekend.

“All the vibration work, let’s say we can tick that box, because the car behaves normal now. No issues to finish the race tomorrow. No reliability concerns.

“In terms of pace, we didn’t bring any part here, so yeah, probably we have fallen behind a little bit extra than the last race.”

Alonso was asked whether getting on top of the vibrations was the first critical step to recovery for Aston Martin.

“I think so,” he said. “I think as long as you don’t understand the problems and you don’t fix one at a time, it’s difficult to gain also trust in the next steps into the performance.

“So I think it was a relief to see that the vibrations that we measured in Sakura, reduced, is a confirmation here on track.

“But obviously, we are racers, so when we come here on the weekend and we see that the situation is the same, and it’s going to be the same for the next few months, it’s going to be an exercise of stay calm altogether.”

Most teams arrived in Miami with sizeable upgrade packages, following the April break.

As Alonso mentioned, Aston Martin opted against introducing any for the AMR26.

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Alonso was quizzed on whether Aston Martin’s plan at the beginning of April was just to cure the vibrations.

“I think so. I think that was the plan. That’s what we thought before Australia, that we were thinking not to finish even the race in Australia and things like that.

“So this first part of the year, between the reliability issues and the performance restrictions we have, there is not really any point to bring two tenths, three tenths, four tenths into the racetrack, because you cannot capitalise on that in terms of results, because there is one second to the next car in front of you.

“So I think we need to find a strategy, a cost cap strategy as well, and things like that.

“So I think that was the plan already from the beginning.”

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

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