Aston Martin are very hopeful that their new Formula 1 upgrades can see them get closer to Red Bull.
The AMR23 had plenty of new parts at the Canadian Grand Prix but three very truncated practice sessions meant they were unable to get the data they were hoping for before they had to switch to race mode.
Team principal Mike Krack is hoping to see more of the new upgrades after being impressed with the little data they were able to gather from Montreal, where Fernando Alonso raced to second thanks to a smart pass on Lewis Hamilton.
“What we can say is that we’re closer than before and that we’ve improved in the high-speed passages,” Krack told Auto Motor und Sport.
“Red Bull is further ahead and the three pursuers are very close together. Montreal is too specific a track to get a clear picture of the upgrade.”
How will the upgrades help?
There is one very clear advantage that Red Bull has compared to everyone else on the grid and that is their simply staggering straight-line speed both with and without the DRS activated.
Aston Martin wasn’t able to get everything out of the new package in Canada but the straights of Austria and the fast corners at Silverstone – the two upcoming races – should see them show their worth.
They are expected to be faster not only down the straights but also able to carry a little more speed through the fast corners. That certainly helped them in Montreal as Alonso used the improved speed and DRS efficiency to overtake Hamilton for second after losing out at the start.
Lance Stroll’s fastest speed trap in the Canadian GP was 339.6kph (211mph) and only slower than Alex Albon in the Williams and Zhou Guanyu in the Alfa Romeo who were both aided by a handy slipstream and DRS activation.
Alonso, however, was still losing time to Verstappen on the straights in Canada. His first two sectors were vaguely similar to the Dutchman for the majority of the race but he would often lose up to four-tenths of a second on the two straights at the end of the lap.
Where is the next F1 2023 race?
The next F1 race is the 2023 Austrian Grand Prix which will be the second sprint weekend of the year, held at the Red Bull Ring in Spielberg on June 30 to July 2.
