2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[CjC]

McLaren (via Piastri) seem happy enough with the pace at Austin last weekend and that some of it came down to not hitting the setup early enough.

Best news is the team announced two more upgrades (after Mexico) to come.
https://pitdebrief.com/post/2024-f1-rac ... g-piastri/

That is good news about more upgrades.
As far as I’m aware there is another coming to Brazil.
Ferrari have said that if they do bring another update it would be a small one at Qatar, perhaps McLaren have Qatar penciled in for another update too.

[Mcl_G10]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

[stewie325]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

You might have missed the Flexi Wings thread...

[Mcl_G10]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

You might have missed the Flexi Wings thread...

Not sure that's the reason. More likely the upgrades haven't bought the latimer intended along with upsetting the balance slightly

[deargodhelpme]

The COTA upgrades were more for future races and not so much COTA itself according to Zak. IMO prep for the new floor here in Mexico.

Can't really make too many conclusions yet because of the nature of FP2 and Lando didn't run in FP1. Anyone have any ideas as to what upgrades they will bring in Brazil, though?

[CjC]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

You might have missed the Flexi Wings thread...

Not sure that's the reason. More likely the upgrades haven't bought the latimer intended along with upsetting the balance slightly

I think Mclaren having alter all of their rear wings for mini drs has had quite a bit of an impact.
I think it was first introduced at Zandvoort (Lando walked it) and was last raced in Singapore (Lando walked it)
First race without mini drs in COTA and they at best an equal to Ferrari, just not in the opening laps on the medium stint.

Thats why I’m looking to see more of their upgrades. They have lost easy laptime with the lack of mini drs and need to legitimately find laptime now to fend off Ferrari for the WCC

[mwillems]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

You might have missed the Flexi Wings thread...

Or, we weren't that far away from Ferraris pace, had a rubbish T1 and got stuck behind a better driver in a slower car.

Which is the reality.

Setup screwed the sprint race. We got POLE (Austin does suit us?) for the race and struggled to recover after lap 1.

All season we've had races where we weren't the clear fastest. We've brought less upgrades.

But but.... flexiwings!

[bananapeel23]

This season could be a start, middle, end of Red Bull, Mclaren and Ferrari.

Though thr narrative will be Lando blew it.

Because he did.

Leclerc and Ferrari bottled it after Monaco.

It is clear they had fastest car, especially since Monza.

Ferrari absolutely bottled it with the horrific 4 race stretch. Leclerc not so much. His one real mistake was Baku, which only ended up costing him 7 points.

I'd bet money on Leclerc winning the WDC if Ferrari didn't bottle it. So I'm fully in agreement with you.

Still that doesn't mean that McLaren and Norris didn't bottle it massively. Maybe you could argue Norris shouldn't win the WDC in that car, but it should be a whole lot closer than it is. Norris should not be 22 points ahead of Leclerc with 4 Ferrari races essentially being writeoffs. A lot of that is on McLaren for sure, but Norris has had some pretty awful performances and misjudged risks a few too many times.

[CjC]

Don’t forget Lando has had a DNF

[FittingMechanics]

Meh, as exciting as upgrades can be I'm looking more for evidence that the prious upgrades in cota and the floor here at Mexico work as expected.
Mclaren was a fantastic all-rounder on all circuits but suddenly cota doesn't suit them and here they seem quite far back from ferrari.

What's happened here?

You might have missed the Flexi Wings thread...

Or, we weren't that far away from Ferraris pace, had a rubbish T1 and got stuck behind a better driver in a slower car.

Which is the reality.

Setup screwed the sprint race. We got POLE (Austin does suit us?) for the race and struggled to recover after lap 1.

All season we've had races where we weren't the clear fastest. We've brought less upgrades.

But but.... flexiwings!

Completely agreed. McLaren was never a dominant car except in high downforce tracks (Hungary, Zaandvoort and Singapore were three easy wins).

On all other tracks they were in the mix just like in Austin but never dominant.

As always, clear air is king and I'm confident it would be a much better result if Verstappen didn't push Lando offtrack in T1 to make him P4.

[SilviuAgo]

Some data from yesterday:



According to Formula Data Analysis, in FP2 SAI was 0.178s quicker than PIA, but McL's engine mode was clearly lower!

1)TOP SPEEDS
Ferrari: 352km/h... and it's still FP2!
+5km/h vs RedBull, +9km/h vs McL


2)BEST SECTORS
In fact, SAI/LEC were quickest in S1 (two long straights)
McL dominated the slow S3


3)Carlossainz55 vs OscarPiastri

SAI's higher engine power is clear as day: he gained significantly through all the straights

Once McL turns up the power, they should be on par or quicker than Ferrari

[SilviuAgo]

After all the media quoted Helmut Marko saying they are targeting Oscar, and that Mark Webber is desperate to have talks with RedBull, now the old man is saying that he never said that :):)


Meanwhile the other funny guy from RedBull management, the one with the pictures, is saying that Alonso was after a RedBull seat, before joining Aston MArtin:
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/horn ... /10666816/

And if this is not enough, also RedBull have eyes on Colapinto, but denying any interest (official at least):
https://www.planetf1.com/news/liam-laws ... -2025-seat

I start to like Andrea and Zak more and more ))))

PS: and a picture with a beauty:

[Seanspeed]

This season could be a start, middle, end of Red Bull, Mclaren and Ferrari.

Though thr narrative will be Lando blew it.

Because he did.

Leclerc and Ferrari bottled it after Monaco.

It is clear they had fastest car, especially since Monza.

Ferrari have had the fastest car at a very small handful of tracks this year. Red Bull dominated through China, and then Mclaren have had the fastest car at the large majority of tracks since. Even in Monaco, Piastri was super close to Leclerc in qualifying and the race, and I dont think it takes some huge leap to suggest Leclerc made the difference in the end.

Ferrari did mess up badly with their Barcelona package(and specifically, the new floor), which derailed the whole middle chunk of the season. But even after rectifying it, it's still not accurate to say they've been fastest since Monza. Mclaren were arguably faster in Monza, they just messed up on strategy. Mclaren were pretty clearly fastest in Singapore as well. And looked pretty competitive in qualifying at Austin, but for Norris' mistake for Sprint quali.

This narrative that Ferrari have somehow had the car to beat since Monza is quite obviously false. This is just trying to deflect from the mistakes and underperformance of Mclaren and Norris, who are entirely to blame for the current championship predicament. There's still opportunity to rectify things, but if Verstappen still wins in the end, Mclaren+Norris will have 100% blown it.

[f1isgood]

Because he did.

Leclerc and Ferrari bottled it after Monaco.

It is clear they had fastest car, especially since Monza.

Ferrari have had the fastest car at a very small handful of tracks this year. Red Bull dominated through China, and then Mclaren have had the fastest car at the large majority of tracks since. Even in Monaco, Piastri was super close to Leclerc in qualifying and the race, and I dont think it takes some huge leap to suggest Leclerc made the difference in the end.

Ferrari did mess up badly with their Barcelona package(and specifically, the new floor), which derailed the whole middle chunk of the season. But even after rectifying it, it's still not accurate to say they've been fastest since Monza. Mclaren were arguably faster in Monza, they just messed up on strategy. Mclaren were pretty clearly fastest in Singapore as well. And looked pretty competitive in qualifying at Austin, but for Norris' mistake for Sprint quali.

This narrative that Ferrari have somehow had the car to beat since Monza is quite obviously false. This is just trying to deflect from the mistakes and underperformance of Mclaren and Norris, who are entirely to blame for the current championship predicament. There's still opportunity to rectify things, but if Verstappen still wins in the end, Mclaren+Norris will have 100% blown it.

McLaren and Norris have clearly underperformed their car. The results would be what Verstappen and Red Bull got in 2022/2023 if they were more competent. This is just the objectively correct thing to say. Anything else is simply deflecting away from the failure of the team.

[Darth-Piekus]

Mclaren has never had a car like Red Bull had in 2022 and 2023. When that happens and if Norris still fails we can claim that they both failed.