Otmar Szafnauer believes that Aston Martin’s problems did not arise from a lack of resources, but from a lack of patience. The former team principal of the Silverstone team points to years of unrest and staff changes as a major cause of the current lack of competitiveness. Aston Martin had high ambitions for the new F1 era, but consistently raced at the back in the first half of the season.
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In the High Performance Racing podcast, Szafnauer spoke about Aston Martin’s development under owner Lawrence Stroll. Despite huge investments in a new factory, a modern wind tunnel, a collaboration with Honda, and the arrival of top designer Adrian Newey, the team still struggles to keep up with the competition in 2026. Only during the recent Hungarian GP did the team – thanks to a substantial first upgrade package – get a glimmer of hope.
Aston Martin wants to achieve success too quickly
According to Szafnauer, the problems can be traced back to the period when Aston Martin’s ambitions were increasingly raised. “I think Lawrence (Stroll, ed.) has had the team in his hands for eight years now,” the American began his story. “Think back to five years ago.” At that time, the team was entering its second season under the Aston Martin banner and had – just like in the current season – high expectations of the new technical regulations.
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Szafnauer explained that the British team overreached in both cases. “For me, the chaos stems from the rapid urge for success in Formula 1,” he explained. “Wanting to achieve success too quickly without having patience leads to too many staff changes. While the most successful teams are actually very stable.” The former team principal of Force India and Racing Point, who left for Alpine at the start of 2022, gave several examples. “Look at Toto (Wolff, ed.) and Mercedes; that is a stable group of people. When Red Bull was still winning, they had that too, as did Ferrari under Ross Brawn.”
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