Aston Martin has reversed some of its recent car upgrades following their underperformance since the recent US GP.
The team introduced a major new package in Austin just over a week ago, but it failed to deliver the anticipated improvement in pace.
Team boss Mike Krack admitted that the Silverstone-based team even backtracked on several aspects of the Austin-spec upgrades during the race weekend in Mexico. "We are pushing, but so are the other nine teams," he told DAZN.
"We have to do better to build cars that have improvements and work straight away. It's something we have to improve on."
Krack acknowledged that the team experimented with the upgrades in Mexico, running two different aerodynamic configurations on Friday to gather data. "On Friday, we had two different aerodynamic configurations – one in the morning and one in the afternoon, to try to understand all the differences," he said.
However, the team chose not to stick with all of the new parts. "The truth is that we did not keep all of the parts that we had put on the car in Austin," Krack explained. "We kept some, but with others we have had to go back."
Krack also confirmed that Austin was likely the final major upgrade for Aston Martin this season. "More improvements?" he said. "We have to analyse and see what we can do. There is also the budget cap, and we don't want to be distracted from next year's car either."
"It's a difficult balance," Krack added. "Let's see what we have, what we can do, and what development there is for next year's car, and if it can be applied to this year's car to maximise it at the end of the season."