Aston Martin announce staggering 2023 car changes

Ewan Gale
Wednesday 25 January 2023 09:50

Aston Martin deputy technical director Eric Blandin has revealed there will be staggering differences between last year's F1 car and the team's new challenger.

The AMR22 began life inauspiciously as Nico Hülkenberg, Lance Stroll and Sebastian Vettel struggled to make an impression on the midfield runners.

In the opening five rounds of the campaign, Aston Martin was forced to settle for a backseat role in the constructors' championship, largely battling only Williams at the tail end of the grid.

But at the Spanish Grand Prix, fortunes changed when the Silverstone-based outfit introduced a radical concept change as part of an update package, turning to a philosophy adapted by Red Bull from the start of the campaign.

The changes worked, with Vettel and Stroll pulling the team up to seventh in the standings by the end of the year, only just missing out on sixth after finishing level on points with Alfa Romeo due to Valtteri Bottas' fifth place in the Emilia Romagna GP.

Changes not enough

It seems, however, these improvements were not enough for the team, with Blandin revealing wholesale changes ahead of the new campaign in which Fernando Alonso joins Stroll following Vettel's retirement.

"We took all our learnings from last year's car and applied them to this year's car," explained Blandin.

"So much of the AMR23 is new, it's completely different from the AMR22.

"We've changed more than 90 percent of the parts and more than 95 percent of the aerodynamic surfaces are different."

FA14, reporting for duty.

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