Fernando Alonso was starting to lose the feeling in his hands and feet before finally retiring his Aston Martin from the Chinese Grand Prix on lap 33 due to excessive vibrations in the cockpit.
The vibrations are linked to an ongoing issue with Honda’s power unit, which has led to multiple reliability issues during testing and the opening two rounds of the 2026 season.
Ahead of the first round in Australia, team principal Adrian Newey said Alonso and teammate Lance Stroll risked permanent nerve damage in their hands if they completed more than 25 laps at the wheel of the new car.
During the Chinese Grand Prix, Alonso could be seen taking both hands off the wheel while driving at speed before he finally retired due to the discomfort on lap 33.
“Yeah, I could not probably finish the race anyway,” he said. “The vibration level was very high today.
“At one point, from lap 20 to 33, I was struggling a little bit to feel my hands and my feet.
“We were one lap behind, we were last. It was probably no point to keep on going.”
Alonso completed 21 laps at the opening round of the season in Australia before being asked to retire to preserve components, but said the vibrations felt worse in China.
“Yeah, it was worse today than any other session in the weekend, to be honest. For whatever reason, I don’t know.
“Some of the steps we did [to make it better] were achieved artificially. I mean, just lowering the RPM of the engine and things like that, so everything vibrates less.
“But in the race, obviously, you still need to go high in some of the RPM when you make an overtake move, or when you have to recharge or something like that. Over time, it’s more difficult. It’s more demanding.”
Aston Martin’s chief trackside officer Mike Krack confirmed the reason for retirement and tried to put a positive spin on the situation.
“Yeah, it was a [driver] discomfort,” he said on the retirement. “We’ve done 33 laps, which we have never done in a row, so I think it’s a new learning.
“Over the weekend I think we did 19 in the sprint, and obviously in between you always have a break. I think he [Alonso] also said that if you fight for the win, it is possible to drive [longer].
“We were not in a very strong position at that point, so it was a decision that was quite easy to make.”
Krack said countermeasures to limit the impact of the vibrations had been put in place by Honda, which seemed to offer some protection to the car if not the driver.
“We had some additional countermeasures here, compared to Melbourne, and the work is continuing, and it’s in all areas,” he added.
“Now I have to say we have not had any other issues related to that, other than the driver stopping the race, but we have not had bits falling off or anything like that, which can happen as well.
“So I think from that point of view we need to keep working, we need to increase the reliability of the whole package, and then we need to work on the performance as well.”
