Formula 1 Thursday was marked by the opening of the Hungarian GP and new important chapters behind the scenes. Max Verstappen avoided confirming his stay at Red Bull, while Aston Martin presented the AMR26B it intends to use to react in the season.
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Verstappen stated that there is no news about his future, but he also did not repeat the early confirmation of his stay made before last year’s Hungarian round. “I’m just focused on trying to get the most out of the car, which is complicated enough. This team is like a second family to me,” declared the Dutchman, who returned to the podium in Belgium, but is still looking to regain the pace needed to win.
Red Bull also confirmed the return of the rear wing known as “Macarena”, removed before the Spa round after problems in previous races. The team managed to reproduce the failure in tests and simulations, although Verstappen adopted caution: “We assume the problem has been resolved, but obviously I’m not sure. We hope it closes correctly now.”
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At Aston Martin, Fernando Alonso sought to manage expectations around the new car, but stated that Adrian Newey’s arrival improved the integration between engineers’ information and drivers’ feelings. The Spaniard explained that, previously, data often prevailed in internal debates, while Newey seeks to combine both sides to guide development.
Lewis Hamilton, in turn, rated his first half of the season at Ferrari as “slightly above average”. Second in the standings, 45 points behind Kimi Antonelli, the Briton said he prefers to think one race at a time. This Friday’s FP1 will feature Leonardo Fornaroli, Colton Herta, Ryo Hirakawa, and Paul Aron in place of Oscar Piastri, Valtteri Bottas, Oliver Bearman, and Franco Colapinto, respectively.
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