Aston Martin experienced a horror start in the first two races of the 2026 Formula 1 season. Technical problems with the Honda battery are massively slowing down Adrian Newey’s team in Australia and China. Will there be any improvement in time for the home GP in Japan?
Formula 1 team Aston Martin is threatened with the next fiasco. Honda chief engineer Shintaro Orihara gave an update on the technical problems with the drive unit before the home race in Japan on Sunday.
“In China, we have made some progress in battery reliability thanks to a reduction in vibration affecting systems, but we need to find further solutions to determine the cause of vibration affecting drivers,” he said. That means: It is still unclear why the racers vibrate so much that Fernando Alonso sometimes has to take his hands off the wheel.
A breakthrough does not appear to have been achieved yet. In any case, Honda practices expectation management. “We have also focused our efforts on the China-Japan area to further improve our reliability, but our performance is still not meeting our expectations, particularly in terms of energy management.”
The Suzuka Circuit is a demanding route for this, explained the Japanese. “We therefore used the insights from Australia and China to better prepare for the Japanese Grand Prix.”
Honda isn’t quite there yet
We are “not quite where we wanted to be before this weekend,” said Orihara, “but we will continue to work hard to get the best out of our package. We look forward to seeing the home crowd and the Honda fans. I want them to see that we have made progress since Bahrain.”
In the past few days, a team boss earthquake has shaken the racing team. According to consistent reports, Adrian Newey wants to retire and is looking for his successor. He is to be replaced by Jonathan Wheatley, who has already unexpectedly left the Audi factory team.
