2026 McLaren Mastercard F1 Team

[Darth-Piekus]

If we want to be serious about it F1 has to bring back simple V12 and V10 engines, allow for unlimited budget so innovations could be shown, allow more tyre manufacturers in the game so the tyres can play a huge role again, allow for testing each time they are going for a two week break so teams can find huge amount of times, bring back fueling with another way of strategy in the game and of course bring real paid stewards instead od semi ones.

[geogate]

that would seem an awfully big investment for not much advantage. It has taken 4 races of brand new engine before i think we can safely say, the difference between a customer and a manufacturer is back to being down to the chassis.

[billamend]

If hybrids are dropped for 2030 (or greatly reduced in power), I will bet the house that Mclaren registers as a PU manufacturer.

I bet they buy Ricardo.

[AR3-GP]

that would seem an awfully big investment for not much advantage.

The advantage will be having an engine because Mercedes will certainly drop Mclaren after this PU cycle.

[Macklaren]

Stella staying more upgrades coming for Canada but also Monaco and Spain

[FittingMechanics]

If we want to be serious about it F1 has to bring back simple V12 and V10 engines, allow for unlimited budget so innovations could be shown, allow more tyre manufacturers in the game so the tyres can play a huge role again, allow for testing each time they are going for a two week break so teams can find huge amount of times, bring back fueling with another way of strategy in the game and of course bring real paid stewards instead od semi ones.

I disagree with all of this except V10 or V12 and steward professionalization, I am fine with that.

All the rest of it would just drive costs and make it less interesting and cause the biggest spender to win it all.

[Darth-Piekus]

That was always the reason F1 exists. F1 apart from being a competition is a factory where new inventions that will be put on cars years later are tested. There shouldnt be restrictions in budgets.

[Ben1980]

That was always the reason F1 exists. F1 apart from being a competition is a factory where new inventions that will be put on cars years later are tested. There shouldnt be restrictions in budgets.

Mclaren have been able to drag themselves from the depths and become a viable business again, purely because of the budget cap. You wont find anyone against it there.

The budget cap has really helped F1.

[Gillian]

That was always the reason F1 exists. F1 apart from being a competition is a factory where new inventions that will be put on cars years later are tested. There shouldnt be restrictions in budgets.

That has been said many time, but it has never been true. This is about "road relevance" and such, but for many years it has been the other way around... Manufacturers lobby to get rules in their favor, so they can use technology they already understand. Its one of the reasons we have this mediocre formular right now.

If you want to see new inventions that will be common on other cars: buy a s class. Or well, nowadays, something chinese.

[F1_fan]

I don’t know if this is recency bias, but i would say this is probbably one of top 5 best weekends Norris has ever driven. From first outing in FP1 he was flawless, fast and one of the few drivers without any mistakes. Also he was so good with overtaking and taking all opportunities he had. This performance will probbably go under the radar because he didn’t win after all, but to put Kimi under so much pressure , to put 20+ seconds on Oscar and to win the sprint is as close to masterclass as you can get without the win. It is nice to know that our drivers are in top top form and we still have some upgrades in the next few races to fully take fight with Merc.

[Balalu]

Re: the Max arguments, there is no argument against how he is a generational talent (altough, no, he is not a God), but what grinds my gears is that Lando seems to be measured with a different yard stick to the other drivers.

Charles and Max screw up? you can hear crickets and butterflys, and they are still considered the best of the best and should have 100 championships under the belt by now. Lando makes a mistake? Oh dear..... the devil himself creates social media accounts to taunt him. "He is no worthy champion....."

The way Norris is handling this year till now, he is putting both of them to shame.

[Danzo84]

Personally i think lando is driving to a higher standard this year in the races he has took part in, probably due to winning the championship and racing with less pressure, probably needs a little work in qualifying tho which is strange to say because i always thought that was his biggest strength.

[BMMR61]

It doesn't give me pleasure to say "I told you so" about McLaren's weak and conservative strategy team. Suzuka which was a weak undercut track they pitted early, Miami was a strong undercut track and they pitted late, very late. Without relying on hindsight they definitely bombed a win here and probably one at Suzuka. The commentators (and I) were yelling for them to get Lando in before Kimi, it's pretty obvious that Mercedes are a notch up on us in the strategy team. McLaren has been doing this since they got back to competitive form in 2024. Hungary 2024 they pitted to cover off an unrealistic undercut and Hungary they made an unrealistic undercut effort on Charles with Oscar that cost him the win. Spa 2024 they relinquished track position for Oscar when they should have extended and tried for the one stop. Obviously Ferrari are worse in this area overall but we are the next worst of the front runners.

[BMMR61]

Stella _really_ hates Lando, damn. According to him, Lando was too slow in his inlap, that's why he lost the position.

To be fair, he was, but its not Lando’s fault as his pace was dropping steadily for 4 laps or so at that point. Tires were going. Should have pit him when the gap got down to 2.5.

Yes but with risk of rain if they pitted and there was rain that means a very likely SC and Kimi get another cheap lead like in Japan.

Strategy was fine with the situation as it unfolded. With a 2.1s stop instead of 2.8s Lando stays ahead and wins.

Post race Lando reckoned not, saying he thought with a perfect stop Kimi would have swept past him on the pit exit.

[Jdn1327]

To be fair, he was, but its not Lando’s fault as his pace was dropping steadily for 4 laps or so at that point. Tires were going. Should have pit him when the gap got down to 2.5.

Yes but with risk of rain if they pitted and there was rain that means a very likely SC and Kimi get another cheap lead like in Japan.

Strategy was fine with the situation as it unfolded. With a 2.1s stop instead of 2.8s Lando stays ahead and wins.

Post race Lando reckoned not, saying he thought with a perfect stop Kimi would have swept past him on the pit exit.

Weird that all the top teams had issues with their stops. I think only antonelli had a 2.0 sec stop. Everyone else was over 3 seconds.