Legendary Formula 1 designer Adrian Newey has acknowledged the strong ‘winning mentality’ driving Aston Martin’s 2026 car project.
But when it comes to bolstering the team’s “winning mentality,” well – Newey knows there will be an uphill battle yet to climb.
66-year-old Adrian Newey made his swap to Aston Martin in the early part of the 2025 season, with an eye to designing the team’s challenger for 2026.
Next year, we’ll see a very significant regulatory reset for both power units and race cars in Formula 1. Such significant changes often result in a changing of the guard, with once-struggling teams able to emerge at the front of the field courtesy of some smart thinking.
For Aston Martin, then, Newey was an inspired hire as managing technical partner, where he’ll be in charge of overseeing the construction of the 2026 car in compliance with the new regs.
Newey has a storied career in the racing space, but his name has been most associated with Red Bull Racing in recent years – until the move to Aston.
In an interview with Aston Martin released on the team’s website, Newey was asked about his role on the team – particularly as to whether or not his job description includes instilling confidence in the folks he works with in order to cultivate a winning mentality.
Interestingly, Newey was a little hesitant to take too much credit on that front.
“Winning mentality is always a difficult one,” he said.
“If it’s a team that hasn’t had much success over the years, then not winning becomes the norm. It’s important to create the self-belief that we have the collective abilities to succeed. This is all part of trying to drive things forward.”
A team like Aston Martin, then, will be in need of a motivational boost in order to show the crew what it feels like to win. Many drivers note that their first win is their most challenging, simply because they were figuring out how to win for the very first time; it can be extremely similar for the folks working behind the scenes to put a car together.
But Newey won’t let that full responsibility rest on his shoulders.
He said, “Now, I’m not a cheerleader, and I’m not like an American football coach who will stand up at the front of a room and give a rousing speech.
“It’s about working with everybody and developing together.”
Working well with others, though, is something that Newey excels at. Many designers and team members who have worked with Newey in the past praise his ability to work on multiple planes at once; he may not be in charge of crafting the whole car, but he does have the ability to inspect the individual components of a car in order to understand how to better integrate it with the rest of the car.
For example, Newey possesses a keen understanding of how aerodynamic tweaks can alter mechanical performance, and vice versa. He’s able to unite different elements of a team that may not have previously understood how to work together.
Further, he brings with him a winning legacy that, in and of itself, is likely to bolster the mood of the team.
But we won’t know exactly how Newey has influenced Aston Martin until its F1 2026 car hits the track in Melbourne.
