Fernando Alonso reveals F1 retirement plan as late start ‘bound to’ cost Aston Martin

Fernando Alonso has given an update on his F1 retirement plans as he enters his age-45 season with Aston Martin.

Alonso, who turns 45 in July, has made a record 425 starts in F1 and will take to the grid this year a full quarter of a century after his debut in the sport, which came at the Australian Grand Prix in March 2001.

The two-time world champion Spaniard was in Saudi Arabia on Monday for the launch of Aston Martin’s 2026 livery, ahead of the latest round of pre-season testing which takes place in Bahrain on Wednesday.

Formula 1 has completely overhauled its car regulations this year, which is expected to shake up the status quo of the sport, with every team scrambling to make a car that can best take advantage of the new rules.

Aston Martin, who are also having Honda replacing Mercedes as their power unit provider, are widely expected to be more competitive under the new regulations, thanks to the presence of multi-title-winning design genius Adrian Newey – who has taken over as team principal for the new campaign – and technical guidance of former Ferrari man Enrico Cardile.

Alonso revealed that he hasn’t yet decided whether this season will be his last in F1 but he’s planning to enjoy every second of the new year, in the new car.

“This first year in this set of regulations will provide a lot of action and a lot of input and feedback from the driver,” Alonso told Reuters at the livery launch. “I think it’s going to be a very interesting season from a driver point of view.

"I feel very proud to be part of this organisation. I don’t know if it’s going to be the last (season) but my plan is to enjoy every second. And then if I make one more (season), I will be also happy. So let’s see. I will do race by race.”

Aston Martin will hope their new AMR26 car can finish higher than the seventh place they managed in the 2025 Constructors’ Championship, with Alonso admitting a top-five placing is “a must”.

The 44-year-old last won a grand prix back in 2013 with Ferrari, while his pair of Drivers’ Championship title came with Renault in 2005 and 2006.

But he is still inspired to race and helped the Silverstone-based team reach their ceiling.

“I feel very motivated. I feel very focused into the new system,” added Alonso. “But Formula One is a dynamic sport. It keeps changing every week.

“There is not only the racing part of it, there are a lot of marketing events, a lot of commitments off track and your batteries are getting drained during the season.

“Let’s see these regulations, how they work, how easy or difficult it is to follow cars, how much action we see on track. There are things that will play a part also in my decision for 2027.”

Aston Martin’s new car, which is certainly visually striking, may be slightly behind the curve after turning up late to the recent shakedown in Barcelona, where it was coated in a temporary black camoflague livery.

The actual livery revealed on Monday sticks with the classic ‘racing green’ the team have used since returning to F1 in 2021, while the car’s nose, side pods and engine cover have all raised eyebrows due to the stark difference to those on rival models. Have Newey and co unlocked a hidden advantage or will their different design prove to be a dud?

Newey believes the team will be slightly behind their opponents in the early part of the 24-race season anyway, due to the fact that their brand-new wind tunnel – which is pivotal in testing the new designs – wasn’t available until April 2025, while their rivals had access in early January 2025.

Asked by Sky Sports News whether that delay would cost Aston Martin in the early part of the 2026 campaign, Newey replied: “It’s bound to, to be perfectly honest.

“We got in the tunnel mid to late April, as opposed to January 2 for everybody else. But more than that, everybody else has been working on their CFD [Computational Fluid Dynamics] and general layouts and mechanical layouts way, way before us, so we’re starting on the back foot and we’ll do our best to catch up.

“We’ve been working on updates initially for race one, and we’re now thinking about subsequent updates, which is the nature of Formula 1 in any case, but also this is a very new set of regulations and a car that’s had a very compressed cycle.”