Newey's first priorities revealed as SHOCK F1 transfer made official

A blockbuster signing from the 2024 season has today been made official, as Formula 1 design legend Adrian Newey begins his new job at Aston Martin.

The 66-year-old Brit has made the switch from Red Bull to Aston Martin, where he hopes to be able to help the Silverstone outfit challenge for future world championships.

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Newey first entered the sport in 1980, and after returning in 1988, his car designs catapulted him to the top of the list for the most in-demand signature in F1. Since joining Williams in 1991, he has amassed 12 constructors' championships, 223 grand prix victories and 14 drivers' championships, with the likes of Mika Hakkinen, Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen achieving greatness in his cars.

However, Newey is now set for a huge challenge to turn around the fortunes at Aston Martin, having decided to leave Red Bull after 19 years of association.

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2026, 2026, 2026!

There will be one clear objective for Newey in his new role as managing technical partner at Aston Martin- master the new regulations set to sweep into the sport in 2026.

While his arrival today (March 3) may even be too late to have a huge impact on the start of the 2026 season, getting his head around the new rules and trying to find inventive solutions to the team's problems will be vital for their 2027 ambitions.

A lot of teams have already started to switch their attention to 2026, with F1 driver Alex Albon recently revealing during pre-season testing that Williams are more focused on 2026 than the upcoming 2025 season.

Newey's gardening leave at Red Bull has meant that he has not even been able to view the intricacies of the new regulation changes yet, with publicly available information all he's been able to get his hands on.

In his first week, the design genius may already get the feeling that Aston Martin have taken the wrong direction in their preparations for 2026, and his job will be to set them onto the path that he believes is the right one, even if that doesn't yield results until 2027.

New chassis requirements and advantages to be made from new aerodynamic innovations will be Newey's bread and butter, but with completely new power units also entering the sport, the pressure will also be on Honda to provide the team with an engine capable of challenging for race victories, with the Japanese motorsport giant having also chosen to depart Red Bull.

The combination of an overhaul of chassis and engine regulations represents the biggest change the sport has seen to its regulations since 2014, when Mercedes' superior engine made them the dominant force in the sport for much of the next decade.

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Aston Martin's bleak outlook

Team owner Lawrence Stroll is a hugely ambitious man, and has piled plenty of money and resources into trying to get Aston Martin to become a championship-winning outfit.

2023 saw a real breakthrough for the team, adding two-time world champion Fernando Alonso to their ranks, and giving him a car capable of claiming eight podium finishes.

Alonso finished fourth in the drivers' championship in 2023, in what he described as the 'best season' of his legendary career.

However, 2024 saw the team fall backwards, not able to achieve a podium finish all year, and falling further away from the 'big four' teams in the sport, finishing fifth in the constructors' championship, 374 points behind fourth-placed Mercedes.

2025 is set to once again be a struggle for the team, with Sky Sports F1's Ted Kravitz recently predicting them to be the eighth or ninth-fastest team on the grid come the season opener in Australia later this month.

"It's a blank canvas that Aston Martin, waiting for Adrian Newey," Kravitz said during testing. "I was going to give them the benefit of the doubt, until I spoke to Lawrence Stroll, who was leaving, I congratulated him on becoming a grandfather, and he was like, 'yeah, it's great being a grandfather, you know, fantastic'.

"And then I got to the point of the car, and I said, 'oh, the car looks better'". (Kravitz then imitated a disappointed facial expression pulled by Lawrence Stroll). "They've dropped back. I'm putting them, with Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll on a good day, ahead of RB. I'm putting them eighth, but they could be ninth."

Kravitz's 'blank canvas' comments suggest that Newey will indeed get to work on the 2025 car, helping the team with upgrades to try and salvage something from the season.

It was originally thought that Newey would not be involved with the 2025 car development, but might a shaky testing and a seemingly poor car have changed Stroll's mind about where Newey's talents will be best deployed in the early stages of his new job?

Will Aston Martin win a world championship?

Regardless, Newey's role is set to be more of an oversight role, with the design legend now heading into the latter stages of his career.

He is largely considered to be one of the most influential figures in F1 history, and his world championship count shows the kind of ambition that Aston Martin possesses heading forward.

However, the team may want to use the experience and talents of Newey to try and find his successor within their team, with future Mercedes-style dominance over the rest of the sport in their sights.

They have a long way to go to become a regular race-winning outfit, and the earliest possible date for a championship challenge will likely be 2027, unless Newey really can have an immediate impact on their direction for the 2026 regulation changes.

Newey has long spoke of his desire to work with either Lewis Hamilton or Alonso, now there's a race against time if he's to produce a car capable of allowing the Spanish racer to claim a third world championship, with the star now 43 years of age.

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