Lance Stroll Has Nowhere To Hide After Aston Martin Purge

Aston Martin’s Newey just swung the axe within the team…and the fallout could impact Lance Stroll.

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A brutal reshuffle is underway at Aston Martin as Adrian Newey and Enrico Cardile remove several senior technical leaders. With Honda arriving for 2026 and a clean-sheet car in the works, authority now concentrates around Newey, with Fernando Alonso urging the factory to prioritize the reset. Another key sign that the copycat era of Team Silverstone is over. No more Pink Mercedes or Green Red Bull!

That ambition raises the stakes for Lance Stroll. If the AMR26 is quick and Alonso turns it into regular podiums or wins, every missed result becomes a spotlight on the Canadian, even moreso than 2023. This is a very major turning point in how the team is governed, for the best.

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Adrian Newey Turns Up the Heat on Lance Stroll

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There it is. There it is right there. The purge over at Aston Martin has begun. Note how I didn’t say revenge arc. And no, Lance isn’t on the purge list. That’s a saga for another time. This may not be sexy news or anything, but despite Aston Martin’s roadgoing troubles, the F1 team has been making a name for itself. Very much looking quite forward thinking. What with all the exciting news behind Honda’s integration with said team, the latest tidbit which turned heads amongst more technically minded fans of the sport is the news that their managing technical partner Adrian Nui has been busy removing people. The news has spread to publications like the race and most importantly BBC Sport as Andrew Benson doesn’t really tend to report on things that are a little bit more on the uh spannery side. When BBC Sport announces it, it’s looking pretty legit. But it does seem like Adrien Nui now partnered up with his buddying crimeman Rico Card now freshly released from Ferrari even though the Italian courts did try to you know wrap him on the knuckles for leaving too early have now begun their changing of the guard and they’ve now begun what kind of technical department they exactly want for 2026 that maybe what they’ve had over the course of this regulation cycle has not been good enough. And now both men have the authority to lead and to choose whether or not it’s actually worth keeping people, especially for the fact that having too many senior engineers right at the top can get a little bit expensive. And yeah, it is very much a necessary evil because you recall all the stuff around Dan Fallows who was meant to be leading Aston Martin into the ground effect era what with all of his technical knowhow from Red Bull Racing and how what we got with the AMR23 turned out to be an absolute gold mine which then completely collapsed in on itself come Canada. He then was eventually sidemooted and then ultimately canned from the organization then making a personal post about how cutthroat in F1 can be. Well, another man that was brought in around the same time from Mercedes, Eric Blandin, is also expected to be the highest profile cut in this latest batch of removals. Funnily enough, he was Fow’s deputy. Although it had a great time of it around 2023, it did fizzle out and die. And then this year, them being round about eighth place, they’re fighting for their lives to at least be sixth. Yeah, something had to go that maybe Newi didn’t have the confidence in the existing lineup to be able to go forward into another regulation cycle. And make no mistake, 2023 was very much an anomaly. What with all those podiums at the beginning of the year, rising as high as second place in the constructors, heck, Aston Martin’s uptick in performance, then climbing the ladder is the very reason why I actually stand on this damn thing. But then we all know what happened. The car design completely went off course around the Canadian Grand Prix and by Brazil, Alonzo was able to salvage a podium, but the team still slumped to fifth. I can imagine that year was a very gling year for everyone within that factory to have soared so high and then come crashing down again so suddenly. And it sort of correlates with the supposed mutterings from now departed third driver Filipe Dragovich about a potential change of driver after said season. the Brazilian claiming that Lance came very close to quitting the sport after 2023 before the 2024 season began, which when you look back at it was a really, really tough year for the Canadian. Lance has now recently quashed that talk as fake news. But of course, he would say that. So take that with a very big pinch of cinnamon. But you do have to admit, and you really do have to get the foam of doubt out for this one, that if Lance Stroll was not really handling himself well when times were good, when Aston Martin were genuine highf flyers, that they hit the ground running in 2023, whereas some of the other more established teams like Ferrari and McLaren weren’t exactly firing in all cylinders at that time, especially Mercedes, then you just got to wonder what would happen when Aston Martin becomes a full-blown works team that they wind up being one of the best teams on the grid. or maybe championship contenders. What will happen to Lance then? Will he be found out or will this be a transformation? Clearly, after what happened when times were sort of good, Lance did kind of reportedly look at the exit. That is the elephant in the garage, my friend. Because everything at Aston Martin now with his DNA and what it’s desired to become is having to be absolutely perfect. Naturally, that is a lot of pressure for any driver to try and match. Hence why Felipe’s comments sound logical given the context that we have seen. And yes, the team’s transformation has been staggering. As Bernie Collins wrote in her book, Force India were once small, scrappy, but efficient. Yeah, dark horses punching above their weight. Now though, Aston Martin is a colossus. Yeah, the results don’t exactly reflect that, but I can easily imagine that you step foot in that Aston Martin facility near Silverstone and your breath is taken away. They are very much the holders of top tier technology and there is more to come. One thing is for sure though Aston Martin they very much know about presentation and within all of that the initial two bastions of the arrow and car department that were meant to get Aston Martin running as a full-blown constructor for the first time since 1960 that being bland and fellows have been put to pasture. That may be the initial spend in trying to get Aston Martin up to the top as quickly as possible under the guise of Papa Stroll who exactly wanted things right here, right now. I don’t care how much money I need to do. I just need people from different teams and therefore my team will be excellent. Well, that didn’t turn out to be the case. That maybe you need more engineer bods to try and figure out who exactly you need to hire. You can’t just throw money at the problem. This isn’t a Toyota. So maybe Newi’s arrival with Cardi acting as his second came just in time instead of Aston Martin probably burning out in a couple of years just going through a complete money spree. And just because Blandling came from top teams elsewhere doesn’t mean they’ll automatically bring their ideas from their old horns and they will synergize with the team culture of Aston completely and the people around them and under them to be able to enact their ideas completely and wholly. And officially Aston Martin has chosen not to comment on this matter. a statement from the team bluntly saying that we don’t comment on internal staff matters and we don’t have anything to announce. Why? Well, perhaps because things aren’t really ready yet for prime time to show up to the world that maybe they want the results of next year to speak for themselves. But really, this is quite a big deal because these aren’t low-end employees who didn’t really matter to the overall widget of Aston Martin. These are, according to the race, senior people who are leaving their jobs. And by doing this, I think what Adrien Nui and Enrico Cardi are trying to do is reset the team culture to no longer emulate what we’ve seen in the past, especially under Racing Point and the early days of Aston Martin. You know, all of the quips that we saw over the last few years regarding the copycat era of Silverstone team, the pink Mercedes, anyone? The green red bull as gested by Christian her? Clearly with Nadri Nui in charge, the last thing he wants to be called is a copycat. They have very much had to rely on elements of reiteration in recent times. That is no longer the case. Originality is the watch word here. Maybe once that advantage dried up and those staffers were asked to interpret the new regulations without any sort of reference at another team, maybe they came up short. The vibe I’ve gotten from Aston Martin, especially with newly in charge, is that he is the effective boss of the team. I look at Papa Stroll now as some kind of overseeing chairman who doesn’t really muck in with the day-to-day affairs, giving Yui unprecedented freedom to hire and fire whoever he wants. And that maybe the players at the top of the food chain originally when Aston Martin came to be under Papa Stroll’s vigilance that maybe it was time for a complete and utter overhaul or maybe a complete simplification. That maybe it might have just been various people with an equal amount of authority and there was no clear-cut pecking order. And there may be some people who may be saying, well, it’s not really Aston Martin, especially not these days since Aston Martin doesn’t actually have any shares in the team itself. They had to sell them to remain alive as a car company. And it’s not the same team that we saw in Formula 1 back in 1959 and 1960. Yeah, that is very much true. And also, the Aston Martin name almost came around in the 2000s with Pro Drive and David Richards wanting to revitalize the name, but come on. So, the switch up that we got from Racing Point and before that is now being switched up again. That’s why this is really important and this is why 2026 is turning out to be so so interesting. There are so many teams out there which are changing things up and you look at it and you’re going, “Oh, Aston’s another example of that.” It might be less of a case of Papa Stroll looking at somebody talented at another team and saying, “I want them. Get them.” And then Mr. Crack goes, “Yes, Mr. Stroll.” No. New is going to be going like, “Are they good? I want them to be good.” The scouts over at that team now are being driven by the sport’s biggest design titan. And no, this is not British bias. This is statistical truth. A designer who’s now realizing himself in a way which no other team has afforded him before. Multiple publications and books touting that despite the calm and smiling exterior, there is a very ruthless worker who will stop at nothing for perfection. We saw the success over at Williams and McLaren at Red Bull. But there was always a caveat. There was always a bigger power in the way to maybe thwart the ambitions of newi. You got Frank Williams. You got Ron Dennis. You got Dietrich Matitz and Christian her papa Stroll. Oh, he’s rolling out the red carpet. He don’t give a hoot so long as the valuation of the team goes up and they get some more trophies in their cabinets. That’s all he cares about. I remember that press conference that Papa Stroll had with Adrien and he basically treated Adrian as an equal with this level of authority that he’s never had before. The change up is real and something to pay attention to. And also with an engine partner who knows what Adrien is capable of. And with a driver who knows what Adrien is capable of, calling him his biggest ever rival in Formula 1 above any other driver. Now he’s getting to drive a newly designed car for the first time. The hype is skyhigh over there. But with each passing month and with all of this news about people involved with Aston Martin liking what they are seeing, the hype is having foundations built underneath them to actually sort of make them more substantial. It’s not the hype that we saw at the beginning of 2023 where we saw god blimey as Martins Quake and then they fizzled out and you’re like so much for that then. And okay, I think partly the reason why that happened in 2023, not just because the design went off course. I’m going have to get the spanner out for this one. Is that maybe after the announcement of Aston partnering up with Honda for the new regulation cycle. I would imagine that maybe Mercedes didn’t give them the power units with the best bits in them that maybe Toto got a little bit salty about it. As salty as he got with the idea of a Red Bull driver going over to Williams at the time. He called Alex Albon a mole. Christian her had to isue himself of Albon to ensure that he even got back into Formula 1. Do not forget that Wolf can be petty at times. And this might have been another example, but you know, the jury’s out with that one. It’s, you know, it’s a it’s a hunch. But really, why should I care? Well, a regulation reset like this only comes around once in a blue moon. If you nail it, you’re like Mercedes in 2014 or Red Bull in 2022 once they got the weight down. If you miss it, you’ll be apologizing over the team radio for years. And Fernando Alonzo will never let you hear the last of it. These rules overhaul pretty much everything. You’ve got active arrow, its relationship with the air itself as well as the tires. Electrical balance, it being effectively 50/50. You’ve got other rules to take into account. You’ve got the lot. It’s a completely new species. This isn’t some kind of tweak of last year’s regulations. This is throwing everything out and then bringing stuff back in. Only very small stuff under the hood that you may not see might get carried over. Might. And if Newui decides that your current technical structure isn’t up to the challenge and that he has no confidence in you being able to interpret the rules on your own with his guidance, then you’re cut. And I really must point out that 2024 was proof positive. Sure, there was some glory with the 23, but the 24 with their IMR upgrade, oh my god, that was really, really bad. It was a miracle they survived in P5, which makes me think the staying power of that partnership was lacking and therefore the people responsible would have to go. This is not a surprise for anyone who has read Newi’s book on how to build a Formula 1 car. A definite mustread for any F1 fan keen to learn more about the sport. But what this tells me is something that I’ve thought about Newi for all of this time. That he is an A player and he has got people within the organization of Aston that are, as he would describe, A players. There may be others who might have realized that, oh well, they’re more like B players or C players. They’re bringing people down that they’re either doing the bare minimum or they’re completely slacking and they’re out of their debt. Well, to get the message across of really to step things up or else you’ll face the sack, you cut off the heads of certain departments. It’s not just Bland. There are six other senior representatives that are facing the chop. I think there are also other things that you should really consider from this news that Aston Martin probably doesn’t want to telegraph over the headlines or maybe some of the headlines actually missed that this runs really really deep. So strap in for some maximum yap. First power in the building has now well and truly moved with Adrien Newi’s purge being proof. The now well- entrenched team principal Andy Cow has already talked about Newi as being the person who sets the targets around that team and exposes the gap. That is very revealing confirming that what this reshuffle enforces that one brain is at the top of the pyramid for car direction that maybe back in the past it might have been a little bit more muddled and there might have been people who might have tried to secede authority from the likes of fallows at al now it might be a little bit more straightforward people may lose power but maybe a lot of responsibility might be taken off the shoulders of people like in mid-level management roles or maybe lower down that they know what the vision is going to be and that that vision is newies and you can either help out that vision, you can maybe come up with some innovations that Adrian didn’t come up with because remember he is only one man and I do believe in the wisdom of crowds because if you don’t subscribe to either one of those visions you end up just taking up space in the cost cap you just end up being a low-level employee but you’re cheap and then there is the cost cap space to consider not only the politics of employment. Yeah, the cost cap is meant to increase next year but it’s become pretty plain recently. It’s not as sexy as you think. The boost in monies is in relation to inflation and certain materials may be costing more than they did when the first cost cap was introduced as well as accommodating various countries employment laws. And I think maybe with Nui there, he has the authority to tell Papa Stroll that having too many top level engineers can get a little bit pricey and you might be doing well in spending that money on salaries elsewhere or maybe increasing the salaries of other people to help maybe give them motivation and be less likely to leave for other teams. And there’s also a lot of things to prepare for. There’s getting the wind tunnel online and optimized to prepare for the brand new car. Then of course there’s a simulator which Newi himself has admitted is incredibly anemic and needs to go or at least be updated. Then there’s Honda coming in. So you got to think about the integration and then phasing out the Mercedes integration. There’s really a lot to think about. So I don’t think you could just keep things the way they are. You just need to make things streamlined which is why I think new is at the top underneath him and then it’ll go from there. So thusly cutting out people who may have come up short and may not actually be living up to their full potential and therefore be just dragging resources and funding. Yeah, okay, that makes sense. They’re senior figures, which means they’re also figures that came with a very big paycheck. Get rid of them and you saved yourself probably several hundred,000 which can be used elsewhere. Maybe that is cold. Yes, I can understand that there are livelihoods to be had here. But you really got to consider what Aston Martin’s vision and project has been. They want to be champions no matter what. They will do what it takes to win championships. Before Newui came along, it was about buying people out. Now Newui is here. He’s realized that that isn’t the only thing you have to do to be successful. You got to back things up by being more efficient and having a clear structure. Even if that’s not really being reflected by one of the guys driving the car. That is quite a big contradiction. And the rumors around him quitting from Duggovich sort of made sense. I I didn’t just rebuke them. I sort of was like, “Oh, yeah. I can actually see that. I get that.” And then the really quiet flippants and just saying, “Oh, that’s fake news. Come on, Lance. What are you trying to pull? Where’s the passion? You ain’t fooling this ladder, man. You really thought about quitting, didn’t you?” Then they’re cutting out emotional attachment to their car. This year’s car, it had a nice little boost after Ila, which I think was born from Newi’s supposed lunchtime powers with the skeleton crew of that machine. But Alonzo has now told them to forget the last four races and save energy for 2026. Very brutal there. And it’s also an indicator of a driver who has seen both sides of the same coin. He’s seen it when times have been good and he’s seen it when times have been bad. Mostly when times have been bad. He’s effectively endorsing a full send on this newi project because he knows the Spaniard. This is his last chance to win that third world championship. Arguably Alonzo should have four world titles by now. And yeah, when your star driver is telling you to make these changes, it does give you also a little bit of political cover because they’re saying, “Hey, Fernando said it, not us.” And on top of all of that, when Newi has had the freedom to do what he wants in terms of car design, we have seen the best of him. When we’ve seen him having to answer to many other people, we’ve seen things that have gotten a little bit muddled. Toward the end of McLaren with Dennis’s influence, then of course Patrick Head and Frank Williams getting ideas above their station and icing Mui out even though they promised him to give an equal spot at the table. When you got those moments when Newui lost the desire and impetus to actually work for your organization, that’s when he would start to fall flat. If you gave him full motivation, you got the full widget. So therefore, it makes sense that the remit that Papa Stroll afforded Nui is that he had total control and that he would be the main man. So it would make sense that maybe if it came to it and maybe they didn’t see eye to eye that those senior staff members’ days were numbered at that organization and that they would be part of the purge, especially if they couldn’t prove that they could actually work underneath him or with him. Because look at what happened when he arrived at Red Bull as an example. He cut out several senior figures there who were rooted in the Ford Jaguar days. Those who didn’t meet the vision of car design that he wanted. Or maybe they just straight up did not want to do that. There is a reason why Red Bull took a couple of years to hit the big time after Adrian arrived. Because the RB3 of 2007 that looked okay, but it was still not performing. And then the RB5 came along and all was well. It took a little bit of time because there was still a lot of things to purge from that system. I think with full authority, we might see that push toward the top a little bit sooner. The timing of brand new regulations helps as well. So, I think Aston Martin’s rise to the top, if it happens, will be a lot quicker than what we saw at Red Bull, especially since there’s not a Christian her involved. And Andy Cowell, you might be thinking, well, he’s got some role to put in this. No, no, he’s absolutely all for it because he’s an engineering bod like Adrien is a technical and design bod. They get it. They understand. There are so many talented engineers who may not have big egos like you might have seen with other personalities in the sport. Papa Stroll has given him the ability to have absolute dominion of that team and he’s going to use it. And hey, I’m not really worried if the AMR26 turns out to be not the best out of the gate. It’s all about how it develops over time. That is something that Aston Martin had struggled with in the previous cycle or well the current cycle. It may have started off pretty good with 2023 but then it completely fizzled out. they just could not continue developing at the same rate as many other teams even with their brand new facilities. Then of course all of this is a statement to many other teams when you look at it from the outside. So picture this you’re at Ferrari and McLaren and what have you. You then see that Aston Martin has brought in Adrien Yui and then you pair him with Card who knows Ferrari’s processes inside and out now unleashed him no longer having to deal with Italian drama and politics and traditionalism up the wazoo. Aston Martin is a clean slate. Enrico can do what he wants now free with Adrien Newui’s backing. Perhaps they’re going to become a full works team with Honda. They’re the only team that that Mark is working for at the moment. Having already built the most impressive factory in the sport, now having a modern-day wind tunnel, they’re now busy building probably the most advanced simulator package on the grid. And to top it all off, they’re tearing out any leadership that didn’t align with the project, the Old Guard. That is a bold-faced threat. Now, don’t get me wrong, there are risks, though, because if they do this too fast too soon, you do remove the expertise that may have been able to handle the trials and tribulations of the Aston Martin workflow and ethos and project, and you might be just left scratching your heads and thinking, well, why is this happening? And then you don’t have the person in the back going, “Ah, I’ve seen this before.” And also if you do put too much faith in one technical deity instead of several others because you got to remember at McLaren there are three key figures within car design over there you then rely on the fact that well that person got it wrong so what does that say about the rest of the organization we are not safe we are not going to do well and especially if you innovate something and then the FIA takes a look at it and goes hey and then bananas it has come across this before he has said many times that he has grown weary of the FIA stifling innovation If that happens one too many times, Adrien might become jaded again and then walk from his commission. You got to be mindful putting all of your eggs in Adrian’s basket does carry risk. Then of course, what happens if Honda underdelivers and the integration doesn’t mesh as well as many people hoped for? Yes, of course, Honda can continue to innovate and they have shown in recent times they have been able to give success to the likes of Max for 7 and Red Bull, but many people are really hyping up Honda to just continue what they’ve been doing already, being able to win races and constructors championships. If they can’t do that with Honda and they fall right back down again, what does it say about them and Aston Martin betting the farm on them? Then, of course, there’s the Lance Stroll element. if the internal politics surrounding him or the leadership resurface at the wrong time, it risks the team looking like they’re trying to cosplay being an elite team, not actually being one. Because if we just get a repeat of 2023, where the Canadian is decimated by the Spaniard when the car is up near the top, the Spaniard netting wins and podiums whilst L can barely muster top five finishes at best, that will not go unnoticed with the senior bods and the shareholders. They’ll all be probably thinking, “We put our blood, sweat, and tears into this project for years now. We had to sacrifice our time with our families just so that means one rich billionaire’s son can go racing and not provide us a constructor’s championship.” So really, for Lance, the pressure will be higher than ever to secure that first win. Even just getting more than one podium in a single season will do. So yeah, do watch out for that because we’re all talking about Alonzo getting his third world title or at least trying to fight for it initially or getting his 33rd win at the very least. I think the target for Lance at the very least is to secure at least two podiums, just two. So yeah, Aston Martin has essentially burnt down the old Malia Jordan castle as well as the extensions that Papa Stroll put on and hired the best architect in the world to build a completely new one powered by Honda and pioneered by Alonzo who knows that this is his last great shot. This is why you should care. This is why this is box office stuff, people. This is probably the most comprehensive reorganization that the entire grid has seen only being contended now by Cadillac. Because the stuff I’ve seen over there, it’s really impressive. It fills me with confidence that 2026 is going to have so many plot lines underneath it, not just the person who’s going to win the world title. Even if one team turns out to dominate, it won’t matter in my mind because the story of Aston Martin and its progression in its first year of being a works team, that is compelling in of itself. What Newi can cook up with his first car with them. There are too many stories about to ignite to call next season boring no matter what happens. I have no doubt in my mind next year’s going to be a corker. And I reckon that you will think that this video over here is a corker in of itself because well, the algorithm has recommended it to you. I’ll see you over there.