Lance Stroll Forced Off the Grid at Barcelona
News from the Aston Martin camp broke just hours before the start of the 2025 Spanish Grand Prix: Lance Stroll is sitting this one out. It's not a tactical shake-up, but a medical necessity. The Canadian driver has been dogged by pain in his right hand and wrist ever since that cycling accident back in early 2023, and the injury has finally caught up to him. Team doctors and Stroll himself couldn’t ignore the worsening pain anymore, making surgery non-negotiable after the Barcelona qualifying session.
Stroll had managed a 14th-place qualifying run—a performance that, on paper, looked about par for what has been a challenging season for Aston Martin. What most fans didn’t realize, though, was just how tough the last month and a half had been for him. Sources within the team shared that his wrist pain had flared up significantly over the past six weeks, hampering his driving and affecting how he could handle the car on longer stints. Even so, missing a race is no small decision, especially with Stroll having been the team's sole point-scorer so far, collecting all 14 of Aston Martin’s championship points this year. The pressure to keep racing must have been immense.
Fallout for Aston Martin and the F1 Paddock
The wrist saga started over a year ago, when Stroll broke both wrists and a toe in a crash while training near Malaga. Barely two weeks before the start of the 2023 season, he went under the knife and somehow returned in time for the Bahrain opener. But while the headlines focused on his comeback grit, the underlying injuries never fully healed. Fast forward to Barcelona and the worsening condition left him and Aston Martin with no good options. When Stroll was seen ducking out of the post-qualifying weighing procedure to spend time in the garage, insiders suspected something was off. Soon after, the withdrawal became official.
With Stroll sidelined, Fernando Alonso will carry the team’s hopes alone in front of his home Spanish crowd. The talk in the paddock is just how much Aston Martin is losing with their key points-scorer out. The team has yet to name a replacement, but the two most likely names—Felipe Drugovich and Stoffel Vandoorne—are standing by as reserves. The recovery schedule remains up in the air; at this point, nobody on the team is making promises about when Stroll could be back in the car.
For fans, this withdrawal underscores just how grueling and physically punishing Formula 1 can be, especially when old injuries never fully resolve. It’s not just about lap times and podiums; sometimes, it’s about a driver’s ability to even get into the cockpit on Sunday.