2026 McLaren Mastercard F1 Team

[SilviuAgo]

First indication that McLaren's gear ratio choice might be the wrong one for this power unit. I suspected after Australia it might have been an issue. I don't know if it's rectifiable within the season.

Maybe they can win Monaco with this car this year

are ratios locked for the season this year as well? seems insane in a year where the engine learning and development curve is going to be so steep? Makes Merc's initial lack of sharing data even more unforgiveable

i dont know if the rules have changed but i think that a team can change gear ratios once a year.

Does anybody know if this is true?

I knew that on previous regs the gear ratio was done for one year. But maybe this year and all this discussion about energy and engines, FIA will allow teams to change it. We'll see.

[FittingMechanics]

Toto is trying to deflect. He is covering for his team not giving full data to customer teams.

[Macklaren]

Toto is trying to deflect. He is covering for his team not giving full data to customer teams.

In my view, this Toto revelation makes it WORSE that they held back such critical info from a customer team that the customer ended up choosing the wrong ratios and potentially screwed for the entire season

[FittingMechanics]

Toto is trying to deflect. He is covering for his team not giving full data to customer teams.

In my view, this Toto revelation makes it WORSE that they held back such critical info from a customer team that the customer ended up choosing the wrong ratios and potentially screwed for the entire season

Honestly I think people are reading too much into it. Toto made one comment saying customer teams make decisions for themselves, and named the only customer that makes their own gearbox. He even said it might be good or it might be bad. If we take him on his word it means he doesn't know, but that his team (works team) is ahead right now. I really doubt Toto is giving McLaren advice to fix their gear ratios.

But I do agree with you. If Mercedes withheld critical information about best rpm range for harvesting this could lead to a mistake by McLaren for the gear ratios. We haven't heard the team say this so I don't think it is true.

Btw I thought the "consensus" was that the car is too draggy so that is why it has shorter gears.

[SilviuAgo]

via @f1insightshub

[FittingMechanics]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDSq7hfbgAA ... name=large
via @f1insightshub

I didn't expect McLaren to have higher apex speeds in some corners than Mercedes.

Last corner looks like a big opportunity, they were much slower there.

[SilviuAgo]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDSq7hfbgAA ... name=large
via @f1insightshub

I didn't expect McLaren to have higher apex speeds in some corners than Mercedes.

Last corner looks like a big opportunity, they were much slower there.

True, at least for Lando T14 and T16 is a place to improve.
Also vs Mercedes but Lando still has some time to find (he loses alot in turn 14 and turn 16) to Oscar, around 2.5 tenths but where Lando shines is turns 10-12 he gains nearly 4 tenths on Oscar there.
Is also true that having Turn 14 and 16 different it could change the whole deployment and be actually slower. Maybe, or maybe not. These cars are so unpredictable

[shinekraj]

Maybe it's just me, but I'd love to see a BMW and McLaren reunion. They’ve already proven what they can do together which gave us the legendary McLaren F1. Though nothing close to Formula 1, that freak of an engine was over engineered to the core and produced more power than expected that took Golden Murray by surprise.

[Mcl_G10]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDSq7hfbgAA ... name=large
via @f1insightshub

Im not sure if there has been anything from Stella since qualifying?
It looks to me that mclaren have gone a very long way to get on top of the energy management. I say that because on that graph it reads to me that mclaren have the same total amount of energy that they are deploying but they chose to use it at different times/earlier in the lap and therefore are super clipping much sooner and at a lower top speed on the back straight.

This would suggest and point towards the aerodynamics now being the vast bulk of the .6 deficit?

Anybody see differently?

Edit. I think its turn 5 amd turn 10/11 we were choosing to use more.

[FittingMechanics]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDSq7hfbgAA ... name=large
via @f1insightshub

Im not sure if there has been anything from Stella since qualifying?
It looks to me that mclaren have gone a very long way to get on top of the energy management. I say that because on that graph it reads to me that mclaren have the same total amount of energy that they are deploying but they chose to use it at different times/earlier in the lap and therefore are super clipping much sooner and at a lower top speed on the back straight.

This would suggest and point towards the aerodynamics now being the vast bulk of the .6 deficit?

Anybody see differently?

To me it looks like McLaren missed the "trick" by harvesting a lot in T11 and then had less energy on the back straight. That is majority of losses.

[Slahinki]

Maybe it's just me, but I'd love to see a BMW and McLaren reunion. They’ve already proven what they can do together which gave us the legendary McLaren F1. Though nothing close to Formula 1, that freak of an engine was over engineered to the core and produced more power than expected that took Golden Murray by surprise.

It's honestly either that or finally take the step to make engines in-house.

[Emag]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDSq7hfbgAA ... name=large
via @f1insightshub

Im not sure if there has been anything from Stella since qualifying?
It looks to me that mclaren have gone a very long way to get on top of the energy management. I say that because on that graph it reads to me that mclaren have the same total amount of energy that they are deploying but they chose to use it at different times/earlier in the lap and therefore are super clipping much sooner and at a lower top speed on the back straight.

This would suggest and point towards the aerodynamics now being the vast bulk of the .6 deficit?

Anybody see differently?

To me it looks like McLaren missed the "trick" by harvesting a lot in T11 and then had less energy on the back straight. That is majority of losses.

The s2 split is right before T11 braking. So basically they were so close in S2 because they deployed there.

You give up 1 tenth in S2, is it guaranteed that you gain more on the main straight? Possibly, but definitely not the 6 tenths you need to put them even.

It still leaves them lacking about 4 tenths (optimistically) to Mercedes.

[Mcl_G10]

Id estimate at this point its probably .2 engine and .4 aero.

[FittingMechanics]

Im not sure if there has been anything from Stella since qualifying?
It looks to me that mclaren have gone a very long way to get on top of the energy management. I say that because on that graph it reads to me that mclaren have the same total amount of energy that they are deploying but they chose to use it at different times/earlier in the lap and therefore are super clipping much sooner and at a lower top speed on the back straight.

This would suggest and point towards the aerodynamics now being the vast bulk of the .6 deficit?

Anybody see differently?

To me it looks like McLaren missed the "trick" by harvesting a lot in T11 and then had less energy on the back straight. That is majority of losses.

The s2 split is right before T11 braking. So basically they were so close in S2 because they deployed there.

You give up 1 tenth in S2, is it guaranteed that you gain more on the main straight? Possibly, but definitely not the 6 tenths you need to put them even.

It still leaves them lacking about 4 tenths (optimistically) to Mercedes.

Before Russell starts to super clip the gap is 0.108s, at S2 mark it is 0.041s (so this small gap is not because of it).


This visible difference of Russell suddenly slowing down is because Mercedes started to harvest, from the throttle trace by doing super clipping. The gap went from Russell being 1 tenth ahead to 3.5 tenths behind Norris.

This super clip event then allows Russel (and Antonelli) much higher energy usage on the back straight which ends up being much faster. And then they are faster on the back straight, so they brake from higher speed (regenerate more) etc.

It is possible McLaren couldn't do what Mercedes did, maybe Mercedes used less energy on each of the previous corners so had more of a "budget" in T11 and the subsequent straight but with how closely matched the trace is in the rest of the lap I'm not sure that is accurate.

I tried to check free practice to see if this "trick" was visible in FP1 but the data seems to be missing. I was curious if this was something they didn't show until qualifying.

If this type of deployment is faster, we might see McLaren (and rest of Mercedes customers) switch to that for proper qualifying.

[geogate]

It still leaves them lacking about 4 tenths (optimistically) to Mercedes.

given rumours that Mercedes are only slightly over weight, Mclaren are significantly so .... that could easily be 4/10.
Its not good being over weight, but it is nearly always solved eventually