Lewis Hamilton has won 7 Formula 1 world championships. Now he is at Ferrari and will try to win his eighth crown aboard the SF-25. Late yesterday afternoon, Aston Martin released the first images of the AMR25, the last car before Adrian Newey takes the helm of the technical direction. It is widely believed that the upcoming season will be a sort of transition toward what is expected to be an era of success, thanks to the arrival of the brilliant English designer. Newey will officially begin his tenure in a few days, and the priority will undoubtedly be the 2026 project.
However, the former Red Bull designer recently admitted that if the AMR25 requires adjustments, he could dedicate a small portion of his effort to this season’s technical project as well. It will be interesting to see whether it is worth investing time and resources in the car unveiled yesterday or using almost all of the AeroTest allocation for the development of next year’s car. In this regard, the sliding scale that regulates wind tunnel and CFD usage percentages in the second half of 2025 will be based on the constructors’ standings from the first half of the year.
F1 teams aiming to go all-in on the new-generation cars would prefer to have more hours in the wind tunnel rather than on computational fluid dynamics systems. Aston Martin looks ahead to 2026 with confidence, despite Honda’s concerns regarding the development of the new power unit. By a strange twist of fate, the next two years will bring back an age-old dilemma: how much influence does a driver have, and how much does a designer impact a team’s fortunes? This refers to the added value that Hamilton at Ferrari and Newey at Aston Martin can respectively provide.
Fernando Alonso, during his time at Ferrari, often emphasized that his real rival was Newey rather than Vettel, downplaying the German driver’s value while simultaneously praising the talent of the English designer. This was a communication strategy he often used throughout his career to highlight his own worth despite driving cars inferior to those of his competitors. For the first time in his career, the Oviedo-born driver will have the opportunity to race in a Newey-designed car in 2026. The Spanish driver has not missed the chance to reiterate the importance of a designer over a driver.
And who else but Lewis Hamilton could be the target of his remarks? According to the two-time world champion, Newey will have a greater impact than any driver. While he cannot predict what Hamilton will bring to Ferrari, Fernando believes Lewis’ contribution will likely be less significant than that of a top designer. The Spanish champion has always been a skilled communicator, but on several occasions, his statements have revealed a clear bitterness toward colleagues who, in his view, have been more successful and more fortunate.
For the evergreen ace of F1, the driver from Stevenage will inevitably have to adapt to the new environment and contend with a fast teammate who knows the Italian team inside out. According to Alonso, the seven-time F1 world champion will need to regain some of the confidence lost in his battle with Russell. However, he believes that the heptachampion can return to fighting for the title if he has a car capable of delivering. That Fernando’s long career has been marked by poor choices is beyond doubt.
There is no need to recall it. However, unexpectedly, fate could repay with interest all that it has taken—sometimes immediately—from the Spanish champion. Alonso, physiologically, is certainly not in the “prime” of his career. On the contrary, he is in the final stage, just like the Ferrari driver. But for once, Fernando will be able to rely on Newey’s expertise, rather than having to “endure” it as he so often had to throughout his long career. Will it be enough to end the Spanish champion’s story in the top tier of motorsport on a high note?
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