Get to know F1 teams: Aston Martin
Hi, this week I'm introducing Aston Martin
Current Team members:
Chairman- Lawrence Stroll
Team principal- Mike Krack
CEO- Martin Whitmarsh
Chief Technical Officer- Andrew Green
Technical director- Dan Fallows
Drivers- Sebastian Vettel and Lance Stroll
History
Aston Martin first entered Formula One with the DBR4, their first open-wheel racing car. The DBR4 was first built and tested in 1957 but did not make its Formula One debut until 1959. This delay was caused by the company prioritising the development of the DBR1 sports car, which went on to win the 1959 24 Hours of Le Mans. By the DBR4's world championship debut at the Dutch Grand Prix, it had become outdated and struggled for pace against its competitors, with Carroll Shelby and Roy Salvadori qualifying 10th and 13th respectively out of 15. Salvadori retired from the race in the early laps with an engine failure, with Shelby's car suffering the same fate later in the race.
The team's next entry came at the British Grand Prix where Salvadori surprised by qualifying in 2nd place. Early in the race, one of Shelby's ignition magnetos failed, harming his car's pace. The second magneto failed late in the race, causing his retirement. Salvadori could only hold on to 6th place, narrowly missing out on a points finish. At the Portuguese Grand Prix, both cars avoided issues to finish 6th and 8th but still failed to score points. Aston Martin's final entry of the season was the Italian Grand Prix where both cars continued to struggle, qualifying only 17th and 19th. During the race, Salvadori had run as high as 7th before suffering an engine failure whilst Shelby came home to finish 10th. The car was significantly outdated by its rivals and failed to score any points.
Aston Martin built the DBR5 to compete in the 1960 season. The DBR5 was based on its predecessor but was lighter and featured an independent suspension. However, the car had a heavy engine in the front and was regularly outclassed by the more commonplace rear-engined cars. The team's first entry of the season came at the Dutch Grand Prix, but the DBR5 was not yet ready to compete. As a result, only Salvadori entered the race, driving the spare DBR4. He could only qualify 18th. Despite being allowed to start the race, Aston Martin were told by the race organisers that they would not be paid. The team, therefore, refused to start the race. The DBR5s were ready for the team's next race in Britain, with Salvadori and Maurice Trintignant taking part. Salvadori retired from the race with steering problems, and Trintignant could only finish 11th, five laps behind the leader. Following this string of poor results, with the team failing to score a single championship point, Aston Martin abandoned Formula One entirely after the British Grand Prix to focus on sports car racing.
In 2006, David Richards, who leads the consortium that owns Aston Martin, and his tech firm Prodrive were granted a spot as a potential entrant for the 2008 Formula One World Championship. Upon speculation of an Aston Martin F1 return, Richards made it clear that Aston Martin had a long way to go until it was ready for an F1 team. He believed the route to being competitive was to partner with an existing team, rather than setting up a new team with Aston Martin and Prodrive. In 2009, Richards again announced his intent to return to Formula One in 2010 with the possibility of using the Aston Martin name, however, this did not come to fruition. Between 2016 and 2020 Aston Martin served as a sponsor for Red Bull Racing, and as title sponsor of the team between 2018 and 2020.
In January 2020, a funding investment from Racing Point owner Lawrence Stroll into Aston Martin saw him take a 16.7 percent stake in the company. This resulted in the commercial rebranding of Racing Point UK's Racing Point F1 Team into Aston Martin F1 Team for the 2021 season. The team competes with Mercedes power units, which it has done under its various names since 2009. Sergio Pérez was under contract to drive for them until 2022, but he was replaced by four-time World Drivers' Champion Sebastian Vettel, who previously drove at Ferrari, for the 2021 championship. As part of the rebrand, the team switched their racing colour of BWT pink to a modern iteration of Aston Martin's British racing green. Cognizant was also announced as the team's new title sponsor in January 2021. The Aston Martin AMR21 was unveiled in March 2021 and became Aston Martin's first Formula One car after a 61-year absence from the sport. Aston Martin have a new 37,000 square metres (400,000 sq ft) factory set to be operational by 2023 at their Silverstone base. The factory features three interconnected buildings and is based in a 30-acre site directly opposite the Silverstone circuit. Aston Martin is the sixth different constructor to operate from the Silverstone base since 1991.
Vettel earned Aston Martin's first podium by finishing second in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Vettel finished second again in the Hungarian Grand Prix, but was disqualified due to a fuel sample issue. In June 2021, Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer confirmed that the team will expand its workforce from 535 to 800 employees. In September 2021, Aston Martin confirmed they would compete in 2022 with an unchanged driver lineup. In January 2022, Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer left after having spent 12 years with the team. Mike Krack, who had previously worked on BMW and Porsche motorsport teams, was announced as his replacement in the same month. In February 2022, Aramco was announced as the team's joint title sponsor after having secured a long-term partnership deal.
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