'He inspired me' – Former driver gives insight into Adrian Newey's 'surprising' hands-on approach

Aston Martin ambassador Pedro de la Rosa has shared his experiences of working with Adrian Newey ahead of the designer arriving at the team in 2025, with the Spaniard revealing that he was “inspired” by Newey during their time together at McLaren.

After his departure from Red Bull was announced in May, several teams expressed an interest in signing Newey given the Briton’s wealth of experience and success in the sport, which has seen the cars he has designed win 12 constructors’ championships, 13 drivers’ titles and more than 200 Grands Prix.

One of these dominant periods came during his time with McLaren, where he worked between 1997 and 2005. De La Rosa was also a part of the Woking outfit in this period, having joined as a test driver in 2003 as well as stepping in to replace Juan Pablo Montoya for one race in 2005 and the second half of the 2006 campaign.

Speaking on the F1 Nation podcast, De La Rosa reflected on just how hands-on Newey had been at the squad, particularly in terms of asking the drivers in-depth questions to gain their feedback on the car.

“What really impressed me about Adrian when I started at McLaren was how involved he became in the race team, how much he asked the driver about the car balance and the car handling,” the Spaniard explained.

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“He got very deep into the questions and into the debriefs with the drivers. This is something that was surprising because normally technical directors don't get involved in the qualifying or testing debrief with the drivers.

“I was the third driver back in 2005 so we had the chance of running three cars on a Friday. I remember in Australia, first race of the season, we were there with the MP4-20.

“I did the FP1 session, so he was asking me all types of questions about going into Turn 1, steering angle, how much lock I was applying into Turn 1, and what was limiting me from going faster in that corner. He was very much into the details of the car handling and balance, but he was always asking: ‘what was limiting you to go faster?’

“Then he would go into the wind tunnel. He would look for solutions and the next race he would say: ‘remember what you told me in Turn 1 in Australia? We've brought this new front wing so that you can go faster.’

“It was just that level of taking the comments of the driver, not only relying on data and applying what he could see on the data. He was relying on data, listening to the driver and immediately looking for solutions and bringing solutions because, at the end of the day, we all understand the problems.

MONZA, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 08: Pedro de la Rosa of Spain and McLaren-Mercedes in action during — Pedro de la Rosa worked with Adrian Newey at McLaren

“The difference between us is who can deliver solutions and who can’t. Adrian is the kind of guy that listens, he's more a listener than a talker, but he always brings solutions. The solutions sometimes work, sometimes they don't. They normally tend to work more than with other people. He's a fantastic asset.”

As such, De La Rosa expects Newey to have a positive influence on the engineering team at Aston Martin when he starts in his new position as Managing Technical Partner on March 1 next year.

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“Adrian's inspired me, but his power is really inspiring the new generation of engineers that are in our factory right now and bringing up good talent, because people like Adrian are very good at detecting talent, detecting engineers that are of his level,” he said.

“It will be a pleasure to see him grow in our team and let the young talent grow as well. It's just a fantastic moment in the history of a team to be able to witness how all these new generations will benefit from Adrian.”