There's no competition for the "worst surprise" award of the 2026 F1 season start, as Aston Martin - despite all the hype around Adrian Newey joining the team and leading it into the new era - sits second from last in the constructors' championship after seven rounds.
With one point on the board, it is only ahead of Cadillac, the completely new project that was expected to struggle in its first season.
Aston Martin's results are way off pre-season expectations. With multiple high-profile hires, brand-new facilities at Silverstone and, crucially, Adrian Newey coming on board last spring, the team was supposed to be on the way up. Yet the AMR26 is clearly one of the slowest cars on the grid.
While it is difficult to determine whether this year's struggles are solely the result of Honda failing to deliver a competitive engine, it's impossible to judge whether the Newey-led technical team shares at least some responsibility for the disappointing start to the season.
Having qualified last in Barcelona, Fernando Alonso said such results are not surprising for him, as Aston Martin has "the worst car and the worst engine" in F1.
Aston Martin's confidence in Newey, though, seemingly remains unshaken, according to the team's ambassador Pedro de la Rosa.
The former Spanish driver raced Newey-designed cars during part of the engineer's lengthy spell at McLaren in the mid-2000s. He remains convinced that the core qualities which helped his former - and now current - colleague win multiple titles with not only McLaren, but also Williams and Red Bull, remain unchanged.
"The only difference really is that I’m not driving his cars anymore, unfortunately," he said when asked whether he sees any change in Newey. "But I see no difference whatsoever in Adrian. He’s working flat out. His work ethic is outstanding."
What de la Rosa believes is one of the key ingredients of Newey's success is his ability to transform drivers' feedback into solutions for the car. And in that regard, according to the Spaniard, he is still unmatched.
"He’s one of those engineers that always listens to the driver more than anyone I’ve ever worked with, which is really beautiful to see as a former driver, because nowadays in this modern world where data is taking over, you sometimes talk with an engineer and they’re looking at the screen, they’re looking at your face, and they don’t know if it’s the data right or you are right.
"With Adrian, he’s just writing your comments in a notebook. I remember in Australia 2005, for example, when I drove the third car - you remember when we had the third car in free practice? - I did a few laps and he asked me one only question.
"He said, 'Why can’t you go any faster into Turn 1?' And I said, 'Well, I go into Turn 1, I turn the wheel and the car just understeers off, so I cannot go any faster.' And he said, 'Show me how much you steer in that corner in that corner, in the apex.' And I did like this with the hands, more or less. And he said, 'OK, that’s six degrees.' And he said, 'In the wind tunnel, we cannot go over six degrees, because if we go over six degrees, we cannot turn the car and generate that yaw and steer.' So, he said, 'But I have some ideas.'
"He wrote down, left hand, and then came back to the next race, he had made some changes in the front wing and the car was a lot less steer-sensitive. And that’s Adrian, just listening to the driver. And what makes him special is that actually he delivers.
"Anyway, great to see him in the team, really. He’s a great leader and someone that is truly inspirational for all of us and for so many young engineers that have joined Aston Martin."
Despite the early-season struggles, Aston Martin isn't following the 2026 trend of bringing multiple upgrades throughout the year. Instead, it is concentrating its efforts on delivering a major new package at Spa, while Honda continues to work on improvements to its power unit.
"We're working on all of it," Alonso stressed in Barcelona, "and hopefully in the second half of the season we can give people something to cheer about."
