The Aston Martin AMR26 is not yet where it needs to be ahead of the 2026 F1 season. According to Lance Stroll, the team is more than four seconds adrift from the front at Bahrain testing. The team did miss a big part of the four-day session in Barcelona, and in the desert it doesn’t fare much better for now.
Limited mileage for the AMR26
In Barcelona the AMR26 managed just 54 laps in just over a day, and Wednesday Stroll only managed 36 laps at the Sakhir International Circuit. Today, team mate Fernando Alonso managed 98 laps.
“Still learning the car, the engine,” Stroll replied when asked how testing is getting along.
“We have a lot of work to do, catching up to do. We have probably 400 less laps than the competition with Barcelona and everything that we missed, so we just have to keep pushing.”
The Canadian driver didn’t feel too frustrated regarding the lack of running.
“It is what it is,” he added. “We just focus on where we are and what we can improve on going forward and that’s what we can do.”
Laundry list of issues
Testing in Bahrain is of course meant to uncover and fix any issues with the car, but Stroll confesses the AMR26 has a laundry list of them.
“It’s a combination of things: engine, balance, grip,” he explains. “It’s not one thing, it’s a combination.”
He feels the new Honda power unit is “a big part” of the balance issues. Additionally, the car feels “not great at the moment” on corner entry.
However, the Bahrain weather could evoke a positive response from Stroll: “Sunny outside. The weather’s nice. Better than UK weather! The livery looks nice.”
Four seconds down on pace in 2026 F1 Bahrain testing
The performance of the Aston Martin AMR26 seems to be seriously lacking. Testing times usually doesn’t mean everything, but Stroll admits in Bahrain that the team is not in good shape.
“Time will tell how much performance we can extract from [the car]. Right now, the issues we have we’re trying to improve it every run, every day, and we’ll see how much more we can extract from the car.
“We are where we are and we have the issues we have. We just keep pushing forward and trying to extract more performance from the engine, from the car, and see where we get to in Australia for the first race and how we can develop going from there.”
The one-time polesitter was uncertain if and how Aston Martin could close the gap between now and the Australian GP. If not, it looks like they will be joining Cadillac at the back of the grid.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Right now we look like we’re four seconds off the top team, four and a half seconds.
“So, again, impossible to know what fuel loads and everything people are running. But now we need to try and find four seconds of performance. I don’t think it falls from the sky. I think you have to improve and find performance in the car and the engine.”
