Formula 1 News: Stroll's one-word verdict on Aston Martin misery

(GMM) Lance Stroll (pictured) delivered a brutally concise summary of Aston Martin’s predicament in Shanghai on Saturday, answering three successive questions about the team’s form with a single word each time.

Has anything changed compared to Melbourne? “No.” Any improvement? “No.”
Pace? “No.”

When one reporter pushed further and asked if there were any positives at all, the son of team owner Lawrence Stroll relented slightly. “Not much, none,” said the deadpan Canadian.

Aston Martin Teammate Fernando Alonso was at least more forthcoming, though scarcely more optimistic. The two-time world champion said the road back to competitiveness would be measured in months rather than races.

“Reliability will come sooner or later,” Alonso said. “But performance will take longer – months.

“The glass is pretty empty, no matter how much we look at it. Every step forward adds a drop, and we’ll see if we can see it half full in a few races.”

He explained why the deficit actually widens in race conditions.

“In qualifying we use the combustion engine for around 25 percent of the lap, but in the race we use it for about 50 percent because we can’t discharge the battery in a single lap,” Alonso said. “So the gaps widen a bit in the race.”

The 44-year-old veteran took some encouragement from completing the sprint with both cars. “It’s the first time I’ve managed to do a long run without any problems,” he said. “I’m happy to have finished with both cars.”

He set a modest target for Sunday. “I’ll go into the race thinking that we’ll see the checkered flag – we’re not very fast, but let’s at least do that.”

At Williams, fellow Spaniard Carlos Sainz is similarly frustrated but taking a deliberate psychological approach to the team’s struggles.

No upgrades are expected until Miami, and Sainz said he was actively suppressing his impatience in the meantime.

“I’m trying to keep that frustration at bay, at least in this first quarter of the season,” Sainz said, “because otherwise the year can feel very long.”