[Team] Aston Martin Racing in 2023. One of the cars still has Alonso.

[E.B]

I know it is widely expected and anticipated Newey will be Aston bound, but is it officially confirmed yet?

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by E.B

I know it is widely expected and anticipated Newey will be Aston bound, but is it officially confirmed yet?

No, and Eddie Jordan, his manager, claims he is not prepared to discuss the matter, according to the BBC.

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by E.B

I know it is widely expected and anticipated Newey will be Aston bound, but is it officially confirmed yet?

According to news reports, Newey definitely going to Aston Martin for a reported £30M a season, including bonuses. Starting in March 2025.

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by ChrisA

According to news reports, Newey definitely going to Aston Martin for a reported £30M a season, including bonuses. Starting in March 2025.

That appears to be what the BBC are saying; another site claims that an announcement is due on Tuesday.

[bjohnsonsmith]

This from the BBC.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1...s/c4gqd8lz9g1o

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

That appears to be what the BBC are saying; another site claims that an announcement is due on Tuesday.

The BBC report says an announcement is being made on Tuesday at Aston F1 in Silverstone, the reports from the BBC tend to fairly accurate.

[S griffin]

Good for Newey, there's no reason for him not to still have it. I'm sure he will be very valuable to Aston

[P38 in workshop]

I saw a report yesterday that suggested a part of his deal would be a bundle of shares.Not sure if they meant the parent group or the racing team,but I did see that shares in the car company leapt in value late last week.\in his shoes I would be inclined to liquidate any in the car company quite rapidly and focus on making the F1 team a success.I wonder if EJ gets a portion of his commission split in the same manner.

[Aysedasi]

Originally Posted by ChrisA

The BBC report says an announcement is being made on Tuesday at Aston F1 in Silverstone, the reports from the BBC tend to fairly accurate.

I can tell you from my 'inside source' that this is correct.

[S griffin]

I think I'll wait for the official announcement

[broadrun96]

Originally Posted by Aysedasi

I can tell you from my 'inside source' that this is correct.

Just a random dude you once hoisted a beer with one afternoon I'm sure

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by S griffin

I think I'll wait for the official announcement

Jeremy Clarkson already did that some months ago while interviewed on the grid somewhere or other..

[Richard C]

It will be interesting to see how quickly the addition of Newey will impact the team. I am speaking here as to when we will see a change in points haul and relative position within both championships.

If I remember correctly, it was reported that part of why the deal fell apart with Ferrari was around Newey's wanting veto power over staffing and technical decisions. Assuming that was a key ask for him, it would say that Newey himself believes staff and (maybe) a broad range of technical decisions are key to success. This seems obvious right?

So even if he and his big brain parachutes into AM, he understands that other changes might need to be made. Assuming the 2025 car is evolution of current car and that most teams are doing design work on 2026. Where is he going to focus? What is the state of the current (and 2025) car? Might he feel that minor tweaks might help performance immediately, or maybe he might feel the concept is so far off that it might require larger changes and it might be better off to focus on 2026 and beyond?

Then for 2026, assuming the design is going to be a hybrid of existing work along with Newey, will they benefit from him right out of the box, or might it require a full 2027 car that uses both of lessons learned from 2026 plus it potentially being the first car that is fully designed under Newey? What other organizational changes might Newey be expecting to make and how quickly can they get settled in and "gel" as a new team?

Richard

[chillibowl]

will wait until official confirmation but when will his RB gardening leave end? if its mid to late next year then it may very well be 2027 that we see his full force brought to bear?

also the suggested annual payment of £30 per year is massive.

i know many here dont share my desire to know these things but in terms of straight salary this has got to put him right below Max, Leclerc, and Ham but more significantly, possibly ahead of Horner and Wolff...which is in and of itself is both crazy but also amazing that someone squarely on the development side is being rewarded so well.

[Mike Harte]

One shouldn't expect anything major for the 2025 car, certainly initially, as I believe that he cannot commence work with AM until March next year. However, I feel it more than likely that he has already seen details of next year's car, and he may have made suggestions along the line that if it was him, he would do so and so!

As the new rules come into effect from 2026, he, along with all other teams, will be starting with a clean sheet of paper. And it's more than likely that whilst on gardening leave that he has been doodling potential details.

[chillibowl]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

...However, I feel it more than likely that he has already seen details of next year's car, and he may have made suggestions along the line that if it was him, he would do so and so!...

thats an interesting question...because AN is on gardening leave, would that preclude another/his future team from sharing their current information with him? the optics arent great but would it still be allowable?

regardless of how he phrased it, certainly AN responding with any suggestions to such information would be a breach of his RB contract and/or his termination agreement?

obviously no one can stop him from working out things within his own mind, but how would notes, doodles, any documents etc that can be connected to his time at RB still belong to him?

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

thats an interesting question...because AN is on gardening leave, would that preclude another/his future team from sharing their current information with him? the optics arent great but would it still be allowable?

regardless of how he phrased it, certainly AN responding with any suggestions to such information would be a breach of his RB contract and/or his termination agreement?

obviously no one can stop him from working out things within his own mind, but how would notes, doodles, any documents etc that can be connected to his time at RB still belong to him?

We don't know the conditions of his gardening leave. We can speculate that while he negotiated an early release from his contract, that his gardening leave may be up when his employment from RB ends. The May 1st press release that RB put out said Newey would remain through "Q1 of 2025". Is that end of March or earlier?

https://www.redbullracing.com/int-en...d-bull-in-2025

If we assume a 12 month leave, and given the time of the announcement, we can speculate that he might have been locked out of and on gardening leave on or just prior to the announcement. So to speculate even more, expect to see his leave end somewhere around March-May of 2025, with a small potential of it being earlier?

Regarding Newey commenting on AM designs, it would be up to AM if they wanted to show Newey anything that would otherwise be secret, but I agree with your comments above that its unlikely his RB agreement allows any knowledge transfer from him to any other F1 team right now. Not saying there is zero chance it would happen, but I expect he is smart enough to either stay within the letter of the agreement, or be very careful with any "comments" he might make the AM (even if he means to nudge them left or right... "That looks nice!" or "Why would you do that?"). Why risk it for likely little gain?

Richard

[Aysedasi]

Originally Posted by broadrun96

Just a random dude you once hoisted a beer with one afternoon I'm sure

I have had a beer with him, on a number of occasions, I've also been to Le Mans with him several times, went to his wedding this year and changed his nappies when he was rather smaller than he is now.....

Don't worry though, I'm not about to go all 'peebee' on you...........

[billy bleach]

Originally Posted by Richard C

We don't know the conditions of his gardening leave. We can speculate that while he negotiated an early release from his contract, that his gardening leave may be up when his employment from RB ends. The May 1st press release that RB put out said Newey would remain through "Q1 of 2025". Is that end of March or earlier?

https://www.redbullracing.com/int-en...d-bull-in-2025

If we assume a 12 month leave, and given the time of the announcement, we can speculate that he might have been locked out of and on gardening leave on or just prior to the announcement. So to speculate even more, expect to see his leave end somewhere around March-May of 2025, with a small potential of it being earlier?

Regarding Newey commenting on AM designs, it would be up to AM if they wanted to show Newey anything that would otherwise be secret, but I agree with your comments above that its unlikely his RB agreement allows any knowledge transfer from him to any other F1 team right now. Not saying there is zero chance it would happen, but I expect he is smart enough to either stay within the letter of the agreement, or be very careful with any "comments" he might make the AM (even if he means to nudge them left or right... "That looks nice!" or "Why would you do that?"). Why risk it for likely little gain?

Richard

One cannot unlearn what one knows! Alonso World Champion by 45 - now that would be beyond mega

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by billy bleach

One cannot unlearn what one knows! Alonso World Champion by 45 - now that would be beyond mega

Totally agree! That is why gardening leave exists. It's about knowledge. In the hopes that after the leave is over, the knowledge is stale. But with Newey, we know that is not going to happen. Now things like written documentation, test results, etc. will remain IP for RB. The leave is all about what is in his head.

I guess what I am saying is that... Newey is not going to show up with 780 pages of Red Bull technical documentation, run down to his local business service shop and photocopy it all and then hand it over to AM! That leaves a paper trail and third party witnesses.

No doubt what does happen (not saying this is Newey) is that some people do talk covertly while on gardening leave. How much information is shared via memory at that time and how pervasive that tactic is in F1, I have no idea. I suspect that it's harder to do these days than it was years ago. For example the more recent rules/guidelines that came out of the 2020 "Pink Mercedes" situation. You just can't show up with a picture perfect copy of someone's widget anymore without being able to show how you arrived at that design. But I can imagine it might be easier to point someone in the right direction from an R&D perspective.

Richard

[Richard C]

Interesting article regarding effectiveness and negative implications of the "gardening leave" system.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/d...ense/10652704/

Richard

[GTRMagic]

How long do you reckon it might take Mr Newley to ‘fix’ his RB20 ‘monster’ if he was allowed, if they still listened to him..?

May not be the work of a heartbeat.. but I bet it wouldn’t be writing off this season

[GTRMagic]

Newey To Aston Martin - Official

[steve_r]

Real coup for Aston Martin. For many years including when they were known as Force India, this team have regularly produced reasonable cars only to tail off in the development race as the season progresses.

[S griffin]

Really wouldn't have seen that coming until recently. Really Aston have done well to keep going reasonably well, so let's see what the future holds