Tom McCullough, Aston Martin performance director, claims that the team will evaluate its wing choices after the Australian Grand Prix. The team is evaluating its options to counter the Red Bull dominance in Formula 1 through its top speed.
This season the Silverstone-based team has shown its potential to challenge Red Bull. The opening two races of the season have shown how both cars have the potential to lead the championship.
Aston Martin’s AMR23 enjoys its dominance in braking, acceleration and low-speed corners. However, it lacks the required performance to catch-up with Red Bull on the straights.
In Saudia Arabia, Fernando Alonso recorded the slowest time on the start-finish straight. The team believes the difference to its rival team lies in the choice of wing levels.
Red Bull has remained aggressive while rolling out is enhancement program for the year. It rolled out a lower downforce and drag specification which helped it to dominate the Saudi GP.
McCullogh on Wings Philosophy
Aston Martin is also introducing higher downforce through its wing for the Australian GP. It will re-evaluate its approach after the race.
McCullough explained: “We have sort of said, let’s get through the first three races. And then have a think going forward, whether we need to change what’s in our plan already at the moment.
“I can’t stress the cost cap thing enough. It’s very easy to sit and say: “I’ll make seven or eight different rear wings to be globally optimised for qualifying with DRS and racing.
“But to do that is quite difficult when you are in a cost cap environment.”
McCullough claims that the team had introduced additional downforce to manage tyres. However, the gap between his squad and Red Bull pointed toward the overall wing philosophy.
“In qualifying, for sure, the Red Bull is very strong with the DRS,” he said. “I think, in a race situation, we have come from a cost cap side of things that you can’t have every wing that you want at every track.
“So we sort of prioritised what we thought was the right thing to do. We knew [in Saudi Arabia] that the wing that we designed and made would be, a little bit, not as fast in a straight line as we wanted.
“But we have to balance out over 23 races the amount of wings we are trying to make.”
