Barcelona Formula 1 shakedown Day 4 report: Aston Martin debuts in the final hour
F1 NewsThursday, 29 January 2026 at 18:30
The penultimate day of the 2026 Formula 1 private pre-season test in Barcelona is now behind us, and finally we got a glimpse of Aston Martin's AMR26, albeit in the final hour of running.
The highly anticipated Aston Martin AMR26, the team's first penned by Adrian Newey, was delayed, and while the team confirmed they would take part in the final two days of running in Barcelona, it barely made the track.
The car arrived on Wednesday afternoon, but the team required the whole day to put it together and only managed to send it out on track with less than one hour of running remaining.
The AMR26, powered by a Honda power unit, ran with an all carbon fiber livery with Canadian Lance Stroll tasked with its shakedown.
However, that did not last for long as the AMR26 stopped out on track and brought out the Red Flag.
Aside from Aston Martin, Mercedes, McLaren, Ferrari, Racing Bulls, and Cadillac took part in the fourth day of running at the Circuit de Barcelona Catalunya.
Mercedes, on their final day, had George Russell and Kimi Antonelli on duty for the day, the latter driving in the morning and handing his teammate over for the PM.
Antonelli: We go the Bahrain with high confidence
Russell ended the day fastest, with Antonelli second fastest, and they both racked up 168 laps.
Antonelli was buoyed by Mercedes' test, he said: "We go [to Bahrain testing] with high confidence and high hopes because, definitely, it's been good.
"Obviously, we had our issues during the shakedown, but we were able to fix them and now we can be sure that in Bahrain we can more or less hit the ground running there as well."
However, Mercedes' lap count was beaten by Ferrari, as Lewis Hamilton (morning) and Charles Leclerc (afternoon) managed 170 laps in the SF-26.
Leclerc was third fastest while Hamilton was sixth, not that any of the times mean anything.
Then came the Racing Bulls, with Liam Lawson and Arvid Lindblad accumulating an impressive 111 laps.
Issues for McLaren
It was not a great day for the reigning F1 Champions, McLaren, who had Oscar Piastri in the car, as he only managed 48 laps.
The Aussie almost never ran in the afternoon as the team confirmed a problem with the fuel system.
"Unfortunately, a few issues today," Piastri said. "We had a fuel systems issue, which cut our day a bit short, but I know the team is working really hard to get that fixed and get us back out for as many laps as we can tomorrow."
Mark Temple, McLaren's technical director for performance, explained the issue that marred Piastri's car further saying: "The car is very complex.
"So we decided to bring the car back into the garage and strip it down to fully understand where the problem is coming from, ahead of tomorrow’s running."
Sergio Perez was driving the Ferrari-powered Cadillac, and managed 66 laps.
Red Bull Racing did not run as they are reportedly still waiting for spare parts to fix the RB22 after Isack Hadjar's crash.
Latest News
Loading
