Aston Martin have taken to the track with their brand-new AMR22 car for the 2022 season, with Lance Stroll and Sebastian Vettel venturing out onto the Silverstone Circuit for the new machine’s first shakedown.
The British Grand Prix circuit is located just across the road from Aston Martin’s factory, providing them with the perfect opportunity to essentially use the venue as their very own Fiorano-style test track.
Stroll was the first to appear from the garage, and immediately noticeable was an extremely raised front nose.
Whether this was purely in place for testing purposes or whether they will be running a raised wing over the course of the season remains to be seen, but it was an eye-catching feature that took us back to the mid-2000s.
The unofficial shakedown arrived one day after the team’s unveiling of their new challenger, with the car sporting wide sidepods compared to McLaren and Haas, and the pink highlights of former sponsor BWT replaced with yellow tints after they announced Aramco as a name partner alongside Cognizant.
Formula 1’s technical regulations have undergone a huge swing ahead of the upcoming season, to the extent that many experienced heads in the paddock have never quite seen before.
The aerodynamics have been majorly stripped back, while the engines will deliver less power and the tyres have increased by five inches to 18.
Chief technical officer at the team, Andrew Green, stresses the importance of consistently developing amid what will surely be a very uncertain time for the teams regarding performance.
“The philosophy for the AMR22 is about being open-ended and giving ourselves flexibility,” he said at the car launch.
“No one has all the answers to maximising the regulations yet, so initially it’s about avoiding development cul-de-sacs – that was the key message to our design team. It’s a huge challenge, but everyone has risen to it, and we’re motivated to solve the questions that arise in development.
“The AMR22 will be the first step in a lot of iterations in the year ahead, which will, in turn, forge the direction for 2023 and beyond.
“In lots of ways, this has been the busiest winter we’ve ever had because of the nature of such radically different set of regulations. There’s been very little carryover from 2021 into 2022.”
Chairman and owner Lawrence Stroll has reshuffled his pack ahead of 2022, with Mike Krack being appointed to replace the departing Otmar Szafnauer as team principal.
Sebastian Vettel, who is now entering his second season with Aston Martin and, having ceased development on last year’s car quite early on, sees 2022 as a “true test” for the British team since they took over from Racing Point at the end of 2020.
“I think this year will be a true test for us and we will see how good we are. Last year, we didn’t show anything because we didn’t focus on bringing any updates,” Vettel said.
“Whereas this year, it’s all about this set of regulations, this generation of cars and we will be able to show what we can produce, and we should be measured based on that.”
Vettel will once again line up alongside Stroll for the 2022 season, which kicks off on 20 March in Bahrain.