Alonso outlines Aston Martin F1 weaknesses to address for 2024

Although Aston Martin was the surprise package in the early part of the season, with Alonso emerging as a genuine threat to Red Bull for race wins, results tailed off notably after Austria.

It is believed Aston was hurt from having an overly flexible front wing removed while reverse-engineering parts developed for 2024 to run on the AMR23 also threw the team off course.

As the team prepares its car for next year, Alonso says designers must address the drag level to boost top speed and make the car sit in a wider operating window to take another step forward.

He explained: “I think we need to find some consistency. Maybe one of the weak points was the car has to operate in a very narrow window.

“It’s the same for everybody [with the ground-effect cars proving particularly sensitive], but it seems that we’re struggling a little bit, and it will be nice if we can always perform at a stable level next year.

“Also, if we can improve the straight-line speed - I think that was, in performance numbers, our weak point. Always a little bit too slow on the straights.

“If we wanted to be as fast as the others, we have to drop too much the rear wing. Then we ended up slow in the corners as well. So, that was probably the loop that we could not go out [of] this season.”

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin F1 Team

Alonso reckoned the narrow operating window was a result of the 2024-focused development, although those “experiments” have helped give the team a clearer direction for next season.

He continued: “I think [it was] a consequence a little bit of the development of the car.

“But, as I said, it’s the same for everybody when you try to extract extra on the performance of the car - you need to sacrifice some areas to gain in others. So, you start narrowing the window.

“But I think we have some ideas for next year as well and everything should be better."

Alonso added that tyre management and Aston’s strategy and “energy” were elements to carry over for 2024.

“The strength was tyre degradation,” Alonso said. “I think Sundays the car is always very strong.

“Execution of the strategy, motivation of the team. We are a happy team; we are a young team.

“We are celebrating every result as a win and this energy is important to keep for next year.”