Aston Martin is preparing to debut a new chassis during the Hungarian GP, at the Hungaroring, in an attempt to solve some of the problems faced by the AMR26 in the 2026 Formula 1 season. The update, considered a B-version of the car, is being accompanied by Honda.
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Honda’s General Manager and Chief Engineer for the tracks, Shintaro Orihara, stated that the manufacturer worked together with the team to ensure the integration of the power unit into the new package and highlighted the importance of the first free practice session:
“The big topic of the Hungarian Grand Prix is that Aston Martin will introduce the chassis update. We are working closely with them to support the power unit integration aspects, making FP1 a very important session to check the functionalities,” Orihara explained.
The executive also believes that the characteristics of the Hungaroring could favor Aston Martin, even without the debut of Honda’s B-spec engine, scheduled for Zandvoort.
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“The Hungaroring is less sensitive for the power unit, so we can expect better performance, even without having our B-spec engine here. It also tends to be a hot race, so we will need to check the cooling elements early in the weekend as well,” he concluded.
Aston Martin faces a difficult season in 2026, marked by reliability and performance issues, such as battery failures, vibrations, and other limitations. The expectation is that the new chassis will resolve some of these deficiencies before the introduction of Honda’s updated power unit at the Dutch GP.
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