Following a surprisingly successful Formula 1 weekend in Malaysia, expectations were also high at Aston Martin for Singapore, a venue that should have suited the AMR26 on paper.

However, the competitive picture at the Marina Bay Street Circuit proved rather disappointing, with Fernando Alonso pointing to problems with the Honda power unit after the race, particularly in terms of driveability.

Honda subsequently sent both its engineers and power units back to Sakura for more in-depth investigations. Those checks did not reveal any specific hardware fault. Instead, it emerged that the Japanese manufacturer was primarily struggling with turbo lag – the time it takes for the turbo to spool up, and therefore the delay between pressing the accelerator and feeling the effect of the turbo kicking in.

That is not a new problem in itself. In fact, it was one of the factors that hampered driveability with the new power unit specification introduced at Zandvoort. But it was precisely for that reason that Honda used its second ADUO token of the year in Madrid to introduce a new turbocharger intended to eliminate the problem.

However, when asked by Autosport, Honda’s chief trackside engineer Shintaro Orihara revealed that it had unexpectedly become an issue again in Singapore.

“Even though we introduced a new turbocharger to manage turbo lag, we still struggled to manage that lag in Singapore because of the unique track lay-out and also the energy-rich situation. That has given some unstable acceleration to the driver,” Orihara admitted.

Shintaro Orihara, Honda Racing Corporation Trackside General Manager and Chief Engineer

Photo by: Alex Bierens de Haan / LAT Images via Getty Images

Asked whether the turbo lag could be partly compensated for by deploying the MGU-K in different places than usual, Orihara explained that this only works to a certain extent, although he stressed that the MGU-K had contributed to the problem in a different way.

“MGU-K deployment can help [against] turbo lag, but not enough to compensate for it,” he said. “If we go to energy-rich tracks, we normally use the MGU-K harvesting to compensate for turbo lag. If we have enough MGU-K harvesting power, then the engine can run at a high operation point in the off-throttle sections.

“That helps turbo lag and is nice, but if we go to energy-rich circuits, sometimes it’s difficult to get enough MGU-K harvesting value because of the energy-rich situation. In that case, the operation mode of the engine is not enough to control turbo lag and that’s why we struggled at Singapore.”

The fact that Honda found no specific problems during its checks at the Sakura facility could potentially raise concerns. After all, it suggests that the same issue could arise again when Aston Martin returns to an energy-rich circuit.

However, Honda stressed that lessons have been learned, leading to new measures – not in terms of hardware, but rather in how Honda operates the power unit through software and settings.

Lance Stroll, Aston Martin Racing

Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images

“Yes, we have learned some things from Singapore, so we are preparing countermeasures for the future,” said Orihara. “We understand that we need to improve our control of the turbo lag. At the moment, our control is not meeting the driver demands, so we apply some countermeasures. But again, we need to check how those work on our power unit.”

The mental lesson Aston Martin learned in Singapore

As for Singapore, Aston Martin’s chief trackside officer Mike Krack said the disappointment was compounded by expectations being too high heading into the race weekend. That, too, is something Aston Martin has learned from and will seek to avoid repeating in Austin.

“I always call them the emotional dynamics,” Krack said when asked about the disappointment by Autosport. “I think Sepang probably surprised us in terms of outcome and it raised the expectation level [for Singapore] maybe even beyond what was realistic.

“And when you do not deliver it for various reasons, then everybody becomes disappointed and it gets more difficult over the weekend. That is very clear.”

However, such factors are difficult to predict, particularly because driveability cannot be fully captured by simulation tools, as Krack also acknowledged.

“It is something that in simulations you cannot really have this clear picture,” he said. “How much will this cost you, for example? If you have lag or what Orihara was mentioning about the MGU-K stopping, and how it affects the drivability. This goes beyond simple sensitivity simulations.”

Mike Krack, Aston Martin Chief Trackside Officer

Photo by: James Sutton / LAT Images via Getty Images

Aside from understanding the exact cause and the measures Honda has taken, Krack stressed that the team has also learned a mental lesson from the setback in Singapore.

“I think it is important to regroup after such an event and try to understand why it happened, in which areas did we lose out and then take the right learning from it,” he said.

“And [it’s also important] to manage our expectations a little bit better, or at least when you manage expectations, that you have a set of risks that could affect it, which we didn’t do in Singapore.”

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Max Verstappen finished Friday’s practice sessions for the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix in second and third place. In both sessions, the four-time world champion was less than two tenths behind Charles Leclerc, who set the benchmark on both occasions.

Red Bull is not immediately standing out from the rest of the field as it did in Malaysia, for example, but Verstappen is nevertheless largely satisfied with the early signs from the RB22 in Texas.

“It’s been a positive start to the weekend. This track is never easy when it comes to finding the right compromise between the low and high-speed corners”, the Dutchman said after FP2.

“The bumps make it even more difficult, so you’re trying to find a good balance in the car and get into a rhythm. That’s what we’ve been working on between FP1 and FP2. There’s still a bit more work to do to fine-tune that balance, but it wasn’t a bad day at all.”

In practical terms, this means teams have to find a compromise in two different ways this weekend. Given the varied layout of the Circuit of the Americas, the first concerns the balance between high-speed and low-speed corners. Based on the GPS data, Red Bull appears competitive in the high-speed sections, making technical director Pierre Wache very clear about what needs to improve.

“It’s clearly the low speed performance that we are focused on at the moment. Low speed is the key for us.”

That is reflected in the data. Comparing the fastest laps of Leclerc, Antonelli and Verstappen, the slowest corners on the circuit are predominantly coloured red – in other words, Ferrari territory. Leclerc is strong both on the brakes and on the exit of Turn 1, and shows the same pattern at Turn 11, the slow left-hander before the long straight.

At the end of that long straight – just before the braking point – Verstappen is almost a tenth ahead of Leclerc’s time, while Antonelli is more than two tenths ahead. However, Verstappen loses considerable ground through Turns 12 to 16, another slower section of the circuit.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing

Photo by: Mark Thompson / Getty Images

This underlines Wache’s comments, although the challenge in Austin is not just about finding the right balance between different types of corners. Equally important is the compromise between outright performance and a car that can cope reasonably well with the bumps, which Verstappen described as “unacceptable” and “out of control” during Thursday’s media day.

“The car reacts to those bumps how you would expect, it’s jumping a lot”, Wache said when asked how the RB22 is dealing with the track conditions.

“The track is massively bumpy, especially at Turn 1 under braking. You have to be very careful. But yeah, that’s the problem with this type of set-up that we are using. It is not as stiff as last year, but also not so far [away from that]. The car is not very compliant on the bumps here.”

By using the term set-up, Wache is not referring specifically to Red Bull’s choices, but to the current generation of F1 cars. In theory, these should be slightly more comfortable over the bumps than the ground-effect cars of recent years, but Verstappen explained on Thursday that the opposite is actually the case.

Thanks to active aerodynamics and straight mode, the cars rise slightly on the straights. This limits wear on the skid blocks and gives teams the freedom to push the limits even further in terms of ride height. As a result, the ride height is low under braking and through the corners, precisely the areas where the Circuit of the Americas is extremely bumpy.

According to Wache, improving the car’s behaviour over those bumps and its low-speed performance are Red Bull’s two main priorities ahead of qualifying.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing

Photo by: Mark Thompson / Getty Images

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