Fernando Alonso has doubled down on his belief that Aston Martin will eventually contend for titles in Formula 1, and says the team has been an “easy target” for criticism in 2026.
Aston Martin has scored just a single point this year and has been rooted towards the back of the field amid the struggles it has had with its own chassis combined with Honda’s underpowered and unreliable engines.
Aston Martin is holding back its aero upgrade package until it can introduce a sizable one—potentially before the summer break—while Honda is aiming for a similar timeframe regarding its updated engine.
That decision has led to Aston Martin slumping further adrift at the rear of the pack while rivals bring regular update packages to their respective cars.
Two-time champion Alonso, who turns 45 next month, is expected to take a decision on his future shortly after the summer recess.
But speaking on Thursday, ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix, Alonso said he will “keep racing” in 2027 but is not yet sure on which category.
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“I feel fast, I feel motivated,” Alonso said, “if I race in Formula 1 or not, that’s a different story. I need to enjoy the category, I need to enjoy the feeling of driving this power unit and these regulations and these kinds of things. There are many factors to put in place and there are many options, you know, to race in the world of motorsport.
“I still love Formula 1. I’m committed to this team and so even if I don’t race, my commitment with the team and with the project is the same and it’s still the same as what it has been for years now.”
Aston Martin’s problems have been multifaceted in 2026, with chassis issues, engine setbacks, and problems with the first in-house gearbox that it has produced in two decades.
“We’ve been very badly treated by the outside world, and it’s normal. I mean, we are underperforming, we are in a bad moment.”
But Alonso has emphasized his total belief in the long-term nature of the project, and reckons the criticism that has come the team’s way this year has been extreme.
“There are always rumors,” Alonso said, referring to rumors that emerged at the last grand prix in Barcelona linking him with an exit.
“We’ve been very badly treated by the outside world, and it’s normal. I mean, we are underperforming, we are in a bad moment and when the summer break [approaches] there are always rumors, there are rumors in the top teams, there are rumors also in our case because we are underperforming.
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Adrian Newey.
“As I said, my commitment with Aston Martin is beyond my driving time, and I believe in this project and we have the right people, we have obviously the best of the best with Adrian Newey, we have Honda.
“We started on the back foot, yes, we understand that but we are trying to put things in place [in] as short [a time frame] as possible but we are an easy target, because we are at the back and there is all this social media and all these things and jokes that you can put on ourselves, probably that’s borderline to be abused in social media that we talk [about] sometimes.
“We are not happy with our position but we are hard workers, and Honda are hard workers and [at] Aston Martin, we are 1,000 people of hard workers, and they go Monday to Sunday to work eight hours to fix our problems and the problems will be fixed, it’s a matter of time, and I believe in the project, I trust my team and we are in this together.”
Alonso added that Aston Martin “will fight for the world championships. We don’t know if that will be next year, in three years’ time or in eight years’ time.
“I want to win a world championship with Aston Martin, with or without driving. That’s still the same commitment in my case.”
U.K.-based Phillip Horton started covering Grands Prix while still at university and swiftly deemed that writing about Formula 1 and the behind-the-scenes machinations was much more engaging than reading centuries-old novels. Degree gained, he went on to cover the sport full-time from 2014 and is as intrigued and excited by the destinations Formula 1 visits during its lengthy annual world tour as the racing itself. Phillip joined Autoweek in 2021 and while he has just about learned to spell in American English he has yet to find anywhere in America that makes a proper cup of tea.