Adrian Newey’s first Aston Martin Formula 1 car finally appeared in testing at Barcelona on Thursday afternoon with just one hour of running remaining.

Having arrived in Spain via plane on Wednesday evening, Aston Martin’s mechanics worked late into the night and through much of the day to have the AMR26 ready for action on the penultimate day of the shakedown test.

But the car only made it out on track in the final hour of Thursday’s track session – running in an all-black carbon colour scheme and with Lance Stroll at the wheel.

Images caught from outside the circuit confines showed a car with an aggressive undercut sidepod solution, an intriguing engine cover solution, a big gap under the airbox and with no sponsor stickers at all. There’s just an Aston Martin logo on the side of the nose.

📸 PRIMERAS IMAGENES DEL AMR26!!!

Coche completamente negro. pic.twitter.com/RmLiqe5Uyc

— Ekaitz Gil F1 🏁 (@ekaitzgilf1) January 29, 2026

Aston Martin had already missed the first three days of the Barcelona shakedown (teams can only run on three days this week so it essentially missed one of those days) as it finalised the build of its new car, which is the first to be penned by Newey since he joined the team.

No official reason has been given about why its 2026 challenger missed the start of the test, but there have been suggestions that it is a consequence of Newey pushing timings to the extreme in creating the Honda-powered car.

As well as being Aston Martin’s managing technical partner, Newey has assumed the role of team principal this season.

This means he has full control of the operation, after former team principal and CEO Andy Cowell elected to step down and transition to a different role for the time being.

Aston Martin has switched to Honda powerunits for the new rules era, but its new engine partner has admitted that it does not expect an easy start to the year.

Speaking at Honda’s engine launch earlier this month, Honda Racing Corporation president Koji Watanabe said: “It’s difficult. It’s challenging. That’s why we would like to take it on.

“Currently, Sakura is also working hard on the reliability testing, and working on a bench testing, and we want to really bring onto in-vehicle testing.

“We are running on a very short timeline, but we want to make sure that we are fully prepared for it.”