This forum contains threads to discuss teams themselves. Anything not technical about the cars, including restructuring, performances etc belongs here.
I’m not making any claims that McLaren will be a podium contender, so far it is impossible to know where the teams will be come Bahrain Q3, all I’m arguing is that their capabilities aren’t that far apart.
I'll agree to disagree.
The technical directive that equalised and streamlined Power Units between works and customer teams was a big step in increasing the chances of a customer team being able to beat their supplier. The budget cap and engine freeze are the final piece of the puzzle, in my opinion. If McLaren customer can beat Renault works team, don’t you think if Red Bull was the customer of Mercedes, they’d have a fair shot at beating them? I certainly think they can. So if McLaren do something really special on the chassis side, they could definitely beat Mercedes. There’s no extra points for being a works team.
Q: (Stefano Mancini – La Stampa) Kimi, will you help Vettel to win his championship this year?
Kimi Raikkonen: I can only drive one car, obviously.
@2018 Singapore Grand Prix drivers press conference.
I’m not making any claims that McLaren will be a podium contender, so far it is impossible to know where the teams will be come Bahrain Q3, all I’m arguing is that their capabilities aren’t that far apart.
I'll agree to disagree.
The technical directive that equalised and streamlined Power Units between works and customer teams was a big step in increasing the chances of a customer team being able to beat their supplier. The budget cap and engine freeze are the final piece of the puzzle, in my opinion. If McLaren customer can beat Renault works team, don’t you think if Red Bull was the customer of Mercedes, they’d have a fair shot at beating them? I certainly think they can. So if McLaren do something really special on the chassis side, they could definitely beat Mercedes. There’s no extra points for being a works team.
I agree.
However, Red Bull has had around the same budget as Mercedes for years and the same level of internal resources so yes, I think they'd be able to compete with Mercedes right now. That's not the case between Mercedes and McLaren at the moment. Again, I don't think its unreasonable for that to equalize 2-3 years down the road.
If McLaren customer can beat Renault works team, don’t you think if Red Bull was the customer of Mercedes, they’d have a fair shot at beating them?
To be fair, in the recent years when McLaren were a Renault customer, Renault had a pretty average car. Mercedes vs Red Bull using a Mercedes PU, both teams are at the top of their game, that would be much closer I'd agree.
As long as the gap closes to a manageable amount then it’s game on. You don’t necessarily need the outright fastest car to compete for wins. But you cannot be 0.5s/lap slower in race trim.
Let’s be optimistic with a realistic lens over it. Ageing facilities will not help to really compete but we can definitely close the gap and cause upsets depending on circuit, I firmly believe that
McLaren could have won 2 GPs last year, purely on Merit, but ended up with just one. That points to vast improvement, within the facilities they have currently. No doubt the new facilities would help.
But I think the fundamental problem was with the complete mismanagement until 2016-17 that they produced absolutely absurd cars. Until the rude awakening came in 2018 with Renault PUs, which also brought Red Bull as the bench mark, they kept misguding themselves to believe, Honda was the reason for their problems. Understanding that the problem was within the team and restructuring of the Working group started yielding performance. They were quite far behind with those mistakes, but have made quick recovery. They need a few good wins to get a morale boost and hopefully next year, if not this, they are title contenders. It would be great to see them join the title challenge this year, but realistically, they probably might need some more time. They are going to fight as a customer team with the factory teams, which is always a handicap.
Completely unnecessary recap but if you're going there you/we have to remember Honda were worse than McLaren back then so it only compounded McLaren's issues. If they had a decent engine they would have recovered quicker.
Finally, everyone knows that Red Bull is a joke and Max Verstappen is overrated.
Mclarens brute force aero makes the car easier to drive.
Bit misleading with the title, Key is talking mainly about the front wing and floor regulations, not something McLaren are doing in particular
"If you look at the way we create downforce, we have massive 'brute-force' parts; a massive front wing, a massive floor that is very powerful and there's much less complexity."
Lando and Daniel seem to be gelling a lot better these days. It’s the kind of chemistry a lot of folks were expecting from the get go. Overall, they all seem ridiculously chilled and relaxed, I hope it’s a good sign. A good baseline is king under a budget cap, so let’s see how they develop.
Q: (Stefano Mancini – La Stampa) Kimi, will you help Vettel to win his championship this year?
Kimi Raikkonen: I can only drive one car, obviously.
@2018 Singapore Grand Prix drivers press conference.
I've seen that Porpoising Up and Down effect and it's horrible and I have a feeling it's gonna be worse if teams try to go faster and not solve it. Does anyone know if it's costing time cause I have a feeling all that movement should be costing time as it affects everything regarding breaking and aerodynamics or floor touching the ground.
I've seen that Porpoising Up and Down effect and it's horrible and I have a feeling it's gonna be worse if teams try to go faster and not solve it. Does anyone know if it's costing time cause I have a feeling all that movement should be costing time as it affects everything regarding breaking and aerodynamics or floor touching the ground.
From what I have read from journo's observing the cars going into T1 the moment the drivers get on the brakes the porpoising stops (pitch moment changes ride height). At worst (dunno if porpoising has been observed in high speed corners) the fear is chassis damage or something rattling loose, the driver missing his braking point due to his vision being blurred by the shaking or getting motion sickness (I do not want any repeats of Mark Webber's infamous radio message thank you very much)
