2026 McLaren Mastercard F1 Team

[BMMR61]

In the meantime I am greatly disturbed by the situation with the fanbase. Ive been watching around and Im baffled by all this. Race 3 is over and all I see is fans and drivers who arent going that well blaming the whole ruleset when the only problem (easily fixable) is the battery. Its a toxic environment full of unnecessary drama. Im seeing rabid fans blaming the whole ruleset calling F1 fake and attacking drivers like Antonelli calling him mid for winning in these rules. The same for Hamilton and other various drivers. What is going on? Its the first time I see such an uprising. Does it have to do really with the rules or perhaps it has to do with their favorite driver/drivers or teams not winning?

Fans will be fans. When new faces turn up in forums with wild claims do we really need to defend against the "newbs"???

I'd say that it's the battery that's toxic, an enemy of what we could call "proper" racing with overtaking as much skill related as tactical. To call something as woeful to drivers as "super clipping" is symptomatic of "newspeak", more deplorable than "Ronspeak"! Coasting through some of F1's classic high speed curves is anathema to the drivers and "real" fans. We can only hope for the FIA to get more radical with rule changes than it did for Suzuka. But I fear that the divergent desires of the various teams will make that difficult to implement, but I do expect to hear more howls of outrage by almost every F1 driver. It seems more get onboard the criticism every weekend.

[SmallSoldier]

Randy Singh strikes again. Yeah what was the strategy behind pitting early when maintaining strong pace (especially Oscar)??? Being undercut wasn't a valid reason. The risk of a safety car, which happened, would scupper any possible reason. Getting into clean air? Having to get past Max and Pierre is never a nice clean slam dunk. Come on McLaren strategy team. When is Courtenay going to finish gardening leave and kick the essential ass to be a professional outfit in every department. Great work Oscar, something out of nothing.

I have to disagree with you on this one… Track position was king in Japan… It was extremely hard to overtake even with a car with a big pace delta… Ensuring that Piastri was ahead of Russell was the right move considering that and the fact that Piastri was already P1… If Piastri loses track position to Russell because of an undercut, Russell finishes way ahead of Piastri

I can't work out your reasoning, after (rightly) saying "track position was king". Oscar gave away track position after marginally extending on Russell to almost 2.0 seconds. They 'pitted him into a gap' - immediately behind Verstappen and Gasly, two of the drivers you would least want to overtake even with a pace advantage! Even with the benefit of hindsight, giving away a 2.0 second lead is something that pre-2025 Red Bull would never do. For a 1-stop race pitting at 1/3 race distance is in itself risky, especially given they hadn't done long running on the hard tyre. Finally - there were no undercuts at Suzuka 2026, zero. I've looked at the official lap times and the hard tyres took 2 laps to "come in". To reinforce this fact and negate any ideas of undercut, McLaren should have seen that Lando was well short of undercutting Charles, well short, why would Oscar have any worry of Charles? Shades of similar horrendous tactics for Oscar to undercut Charles at Budapest last year that cost him a win??? Undercuts shouldn't be hit and hope, but assessed on observable facts.

Sorry, but McLaren gave away a realistic chance of a great and rare victory today. Still as Oscar said, that we're disappointed with a 2nd place at this stage is in itself encouraging.

Combination of faster pace and brand new hards should have made a potential overtake over VER and GAS not too complicated,,, Staying out to hope for a Safety Car (which didn’t happened due to reliability) seems too big of a gamble when you are winning the race.

We will never know if the undercut would have worked for the Mercedes car, what is clear is that they had a lot more pace than McLaren and that among the top 3 (Mercedes, Ferrari, McLaren) it was difficult to overtake.

I know it’s easy to jump on the strategy team, some of their calls sometimes have been questionable… but I don’t think they missed an opportunity in Japan because of strategy… at least not at the moment the calls where made, knowing the outcome now, sure.

[venkyhere]

In the meantime I am greatly disturbed by the situation with the fanbase. Ive been watching around and Im baffled by all this. Race 3 is over and all I see is fans and drivers who arent going that well blaming the whole ruleset when the only problem (easily fixable) is the battery. Its a toxic environment full of unnecessary drama. Im seeing rabid fans blaming the whole ruleset calling F1 fake and attacking drivers like Antonelli calling him mid for winning in these rules. The same for Hamilton and other various drivers. What is going on? Its the first time I see such an uprising. Does it have to do really with the rules or perhaps it has to do with their favorite driver/drivers or teams not winning?

are you equally disturbed by Lando Norris' post Suzuka take on the ruleset, as much as you are by the take of 'rabid fans' ?

[Darth-Piekus]

Not really. Im disturbed by the way some fans are presenting their case damning the whole ruleset when the only problem is the battery deployment followed by profanity to every different opinion.

[venkyhere]

Not really. Im disturbed by the way some fans are presenting their case damning the whole ruleset when the only problem is the battery deployment followed by profanity to every different opinion.

How different is that, to what Norris said ?
Did you read/hear what he said ? His take pretty much sums up what us 'rabid fans' have been saying since Melbourne. The driver is not allowed to vary his inputs at the same location, depending on the race circumstance, or depending on whether it's Q3 instead of Q1. His pedal inputs have to be 'machine accurate' inorder to not confuse the deploy/recharge algorithm. 'Decision making' has been taken away from the driver.

[Darth-Piekus]

Its the way its being worded.

[venkyhere]

Its the way its being worded.

and you are not 'disturbed' by how Norris is wording it ?
This post shows how his opinion changed 180 degrees from Melbourne-thursday to Japan-sunday :
viewtopic.php?p=1339123#p1339123

[Darth-Piekus]

I am not because he is respectful unlike the one who posted. And I prefer to see it as half full instead as half empty. And I dont see why decision making has been taken away when it requires you to strategize for maximum efficiency. And its not a problem it cant be fixed.

[BMMR61]

I am not because he is respectful unlike the one who posted. And I prefer to see it as half full instead as half empty. And I dont see why decision making has been taken away when it requires you to strategize for maximum efficiency. And its not a problem it cant be fixed.

Not to jump all over you but, the drivers are almost universally critical. The horrible Bearman crash was a direct consequence of super clipping (and it's a horrible term to adopt). I hate the regs, and have long been doubtful that 2026 would be a season worth wasting many late nights here in Australia.

One of the worries of restoring F1 to a competition worthy of the world's best drivers is that casual fans love the drama of ridiculous overtaking that has little to do with outright driving ability. The only really notable pass at Suzuka in my opinion was Charles's pass on George at turn 1. Maybe the FIA can tweak it but the tweaks so far have been way too little too late.

[Darth-Piekus]

Do you know when was the last time F1 was genuine? 1950 to 2008. Half of those that are criticising the rules havent seen those eras. Are you telling me that people discovered the problem now and were content with the crappy rules of 2009-2025 with one DRS zones and cars that were unable to make a single or unable to follow the lead car? Or were they content that we have one tyre manufacturer, so few engine manufacturers, budget cap, no unlimited testing that brought us spec b, spec c and spec d, pit stop fueling and V10-V12 engines. Its hypocritical (not you, Im talking generally) to act like the problem is these rules specifically when the problem was chronial.

But regarding these rules the only problem is the battery. All you need to do is open the rules and go for a redesign even in the middle of the championship. A battery that can hold double or triple the amount of power and can be charged just as fast and the problem is solved. Lets give it some time to see what solution can they find. Ranting about it every single race certainly wont solve it faster.

[FittingMechanics]

Stella said in his short video (recapping the race) that they will bring upgrades in Miami and Canada.

Not really a groundbreaking revelation as there is 4 weeks until Miami and then 3 weeks to Canada so most teams will bring upgrades, but just info for everyone here.

Quietly optimistic on my end. Things seem under control.

[Ground Effect]

Randy Singh strikes again. Yeah what was the strategy behind pitting early when maintaining strong pace (especially Oscar)??? Being undercut wasn't a valid reason. The risk of a safety car, which happened, would scupper any possible reason. Getting into clean air? Having to get past Max and Pierre is never a nice clean slam dunk. Come on McLaren strategy team. When is Courtenay going to finish gardening leave and kick the essential ass to be a professional outfit in every department. Great work Oscar, something out of nothing.

I have to disagree with you on this one… Track position was king in Japan… It was extremely hard to overtake even with a car with a big pace delta… Ensuring that Piastri was ahead of Russell was the right move considering that and the fact that Piastri was already P1… If Piastri loses track position to Russell because of an undercut, Russell finishes way ahead of Piastri

I can't work out your reasoning, after (rightly) saying "track position was king". Oscar gave away track position after marginally extending on Russell to almost 2.0 seconds. They 'pitted him into a gap' - immediately behind Verstappen and Gasly, two of the drivers you would least want to overtake even with a pace advantage! Even with the benefit of hindsight, giving away a 2.0 second lead is something that pre-2025 Red Bull would never do. For a 1-stop race pitting at 1/3 race distance is in itself risky, especially given they hadn't done long running on the hard tyre. Finally - there were no undercuts at Suzuka 2026, zero. I've looked at the official lap times and the hard tyres took 2 laps to "come in". To reinforce this fact and negate any ideas of undercut, McLaren should have seen that Lando was well short of undercutting Charles, well short, why would Oscar have any worry of Charles? Shades of similar horrendous tactics for Oscar to undercut Charles at Budapest last year that cost him a win??? Undercuts shouldn't be hit and hope, but assessed on observable facts.

Sorry, but McLaren gave away a realistic chance of a great and rare victory today. Still as Oscar said, that we're disappointed with a 2nd place at this stage is in itself encouraging.

But wasn't Oscar ahead of George after the pit stops? He didn't lose track position to George, and Kimi got ahead due to the safety car. Without it, it would have taken Kimi passing George and Oscar to lead.

[FittingMechanics]

But wasn't Oscar ahead of George after the pit stops? He didn't lose track position to George, and Kimi got ahead due to the safety car. Without it, it would have taken Kimi passing George and Oscar to lead.

I understand the complaint but it is really pushing it. Usually undercuts work and Mercedes is much faster. Antonelli in clean air was able to be 0.5-1s faster. I know Russell didn't seem to have the same pace following Piastri but if Russell went to pits first, who is to say that Russell couldn't extract a lot of laptime from a new hard and undercut Piastri.

Btw Piastri immediately after exiting pits was matching or faster than Russell, even though he had to get through Verstappen and Gasly. He was able to extract laptime from the tire even through traffic. Russell would surely be able to do the same.

Not going to pit and waiting to react is exactly the type of decision paralysis they had last year. This call to preempt Mercedes was the right one and only a very unlucky SC gave it to Antonelli. I would like to know how long Mercedes would keep Antonelli out. They would probably gamble with going long because they had Russell on the other strategy and Antonelli still had good pace.

[De Wet]

I am not because he is respectful unlike the one who posted. And I prefer to see it as half full instead as half empty. And I dont see why decision making has been taken away when it requires you to strategize for maximum efficiency. And its not a problem it cant be fixed.

You seriously think these idiots who allowed these stupid engine rules will fix it properly ?

[Darth-Piekus]

I am not because he is respectful unlike the one who posted. And I prefer to see it as half full instead as half empty. And I dont see why decision making has been taken away when it requires you to strategize for maximum efficiency. And its not a problem it cant be fixed.

You seriously think these idiots who allowed these stupid engine rules will fix it properly ?

I can't tell you if they can or not but I would like to give them a chance to do it. It's not really hard to fix it. Just bring a battery that can last twice or thrice as much and the problem is solved. You need battery power duration.