2018 McLaren F1 Team - Renault

[Redragon]

Abiteboul on Autosport : "There are a number of things that we could not offer, like financial support, like access to core facilities, because our priority and focus is on the consolidation of the performance of Renault Sport F1."

He suggested having just one customer team in McLaren "is good for us because it will allow us to really focus" on the works Renault programme.

"Obviously when you supply Red Bull Racing, which is a high-maintenance team because of their ambition and their expectation, it is always a bit of a distraction for the rest that we have to do," said Abiteboul.

This is interesting. I also read something about a spec C which will debut later this year. Has there been any more info regarding this?

He is just a mouth, one week was crying to Redbull to take a decision on renewing, now he lost the costumer is playing cool. I think he should focus on bringnning a engine to thel evel of ferrari and Mercedes that at the moment is failing to do and then he can be worried on loosing costumers

[GhostF1]

More cooling holes in the engine cover?

https://imgr1.auto-motor-und-sport.de/M ... 171377.jpg

Source: AMuS

That looks like the tail of the Star in Chandon's logo. Assuming that we are in France so they get a bigger display? They are a French company.

[trinidefender]

One thing people seem to not be talking about is funding. At present I would estimate that McLaren is probably the 5th most well funded F1 team with Renault ahead of them and Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull a long way in front of Renault again. It should be no surprise then that McLaren are 5th currently. They simply don't have the budget of the other teams currently, not since the days of Vodafone and Mercedes works teams status.

That is where Zak B comes in trying to bring sponsorship money which so far seems to be working. It is my belief that McLarens only hope for the future is to do what Ferrari does by expanding its road car business and using some of that money to support its Formula 1 team. This can be done incrementally over then next 10 years. That $153 million dollar investment is a good start.

What I believe will be cruicial to do before the 2021 cost cap is to upgrade facilities, get better simulators or what have you. Otherwise obtaining this equipment during that period will probably eat into a teams annual restricted budget. When that is established more of the budget can be spent on personnel year on year.

People love to bash EB but the problem is he can only work with the budget that he is given. There is a good possibility that he simply can't hire the number and scope of engineers that he wants to.

Edit: my atrocious grammar

[ScrewCaptain27]

More cooling holes in the engine cover?

https://imgr1.auto-motor-und-sport.de/M ... 171377.jpg

Source: AMuS

That looks like the tail of the Star in Chandon's logo. Assuming that we are in France so they get a bigger display? They are a French company.

No, alcohol advertising is actually illegal in France. You will see the star logo as used in Islamic countries for this race.

[kfrantzios]

One thing people seem to not be talking about is funding. At present I would estimate that McLaren is probably the 5th most well funded F1 team with Renault ahead of them and Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull a long way in front of Renault again. It should be no surprise then that McLaren are 5th currently. They simply don't have the budget of the other teams currently, not since the days of Vodafone and Mercedes works teams status.

That is where Zak B comes in trying to bring sponsorship money which so far seems to be working. It is my belief that McLarens only hope for the future is to do what Ferrari does by expanding its road car business and using some of that money to support its Formula 1 team. This can be done incrementally over then next 10 years. That $153 million dollar investment is a good start.

What I believe will be cruicial to do before the 2021 cost cap is to upgrade facilities, get better simulators or what have you. Otherwise obtaining this equipment during that period will probably eat into a teams annual restricted budget. When that is established more of the budget can be spent on personnel year on year.

People love to bash EB but the problem is he can only work with the budget that he is given. There is a good possibility that he simply can't hire the number and scope of engineers that he wants to.

Edit: my atrocious grammar

Nice to know that someone understands the business logic behind some moves...

[GhostF1]

More cooling holes in the engine cover?

https://imgr1.auto-motor-und-sport.de/M ... 171377.jpg

Source: AMuS

That looks like the tail of the Star in Chandon's logo. Assuming that we are in France so they get a bigger display? They are a French company.

No, alcohol advertising is actually illegal in France. You will see the star logo as used in Islamic countries for this race.

Kinda what I was getting at. They'll have the Chandon Star logo, more prominent because, only my assumption, it's the French GP

[DiogoBrand]

That looks like the tail of the Star in Chandon's logo. Assuming that we are in France so they get a bigger display? They are a French company.

No, alcohol advertising is actually illegal in France. You will see the star logo as used in Islamic countries for this race.

Kinda what I was getting at. They'll have the Chandon Star logo, more prominent because, only my assumption, it's the French GP

How ironic it is that you can't advertise champagne at France?

[Andres125sx]

7 races are done, which is precisely only a third of the season.

Mclaren are currently in 5th place in the constructors championship.

Neither of the two of the drivers have had grid penalties.

They have already introduced a major nose update.

The rest of the package will come in increments possibly the bigger one in Silverstone [home race].

If not for gearbox failure[painful as it only needed to do 20 more laps before change] in Monaco and a broken charge cooler pipe in Canada, Mclaren would be ahead of works Renault in the constructors.

Eric Boullier has clearly stated that because of their lack of performance in slow speed corners they are having to run a compromised setup. Stoffel and EB have said work is on to solve this issue on a big scale back in the factory. They have not given up on the 2018 car.

If you see the amount of hysteria you must think Mclaren has been obliterated off the F1 map. IMHO They will finish clearly the 4th fastest team come the end of the season in terms of pace come the end of the season.

The problem is that people do not understand how with a new power unit Mclaren have had to completely redesign the rear end plus there will be things like weight distribution and consequent ballast placement which has a significant role in performance. I could understand if it was the final third of the season but clearly there is enough time left in the season for Mclaren to salvage this season. If Mclaren are as competitive as they are now in the final third of the season i can understand but after a power unit change and barely after a third of the season the amount of negative propaganda is clearly way out of proportion.

7 races are done, no points in the last two races, two seconds of the pace, already beaten by Toro Rosso, Force India, Renault, Sauber and Haas, no problems have been fixed, talk about easily clearing the midfield didn't happen, 14th and 15th in Canada (quali), do I need to continue? Is this what you expected from the team that had 'one of the best chassis' last year and said goodbye to 100 million dollars. Don't make me laugh, stop defending this team that clearly isn't performing. Nobody expected them to beat Red Bull, but their pace hasn't been good at all. If you expect them to be easily fourth at the end of the season you're just as delusional as Boullier, Brown and Alonso.

I think you know better than that. Compare that situation with past season. If you think the step forward has not been noticeable then you should stop paying attention to PR BS they, or any other team, throw, and pay more attention to reality.

From 2017 to 2018 they´ve gone from 9th team and the less reliable in the grid, to 4-5th team and the most reliable. If you were expecting more than that at first third of a season with a new PU, sorry but you should stop buying marketing BS and keep real

[Ground Effect]

Mclaren interested in Daniel Ricciardo? The article appears to have some quotes from Marko as well.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2018/ ... rdo-report

[Ground Effect]

This doesn't make sense. Mclaren won't be fighting for titles soon, I'm sure Ricciardo knows this, Zak has said it recently. So, maybe another non story?

[bauc]

This doesn't make sense. Mclaren won't be fighting for titles soon, I'm sure Ricciardo knows this, Zak has said it recently. So, maybe another non story?

Yeah most probably just another story to pass around. Ricardo in my opinion is going in the Red car next year

[trinidefender]

This doesn't make sense. Mclaren won't be fighting for titles soon, I'm sure Ricciardo knows this, Zak has said it recently. So, maybe another non story?

Yeah most probably just another story to pass around. Ricardo in my opinion is going in the Red car next year

Doubtful he will go to Ferrari. Vettel will veto that. McLaren knows that they can't afford to fall into the same trap as Williams. You need at least one experienced and good driver to develop a car throughout a season.

For example; Button was known for being able to tell his engineers exactly how a car felt and that helped to set the car up. That's probably why even though he never had the raw pace of some drivers, he was always consistently quick.

If Fernando leaves then it leaves McLaren without that cruicial top driver to give good feedback. Therefore it makes developing future cars even harder as the direction to take isn't as certain. McLaren trying to get DR makes perfect sense actually.

[makecry]

This doesn't make sense. Mclaren won't be fighting for titles soon, I'm sure Ricciardo knows this, Zak has said it recently. So, maybe another non story?

Yeah most probably just another story to pass around. Ricardo in my opinion is going in the Red car next year

Sadly going in the red car is not as easy as walking into your favorite grocery store. As much I want Ricciardo to be in Ferrari to expose Vettel AGAIN, It's not going to happen.

[adrianjordan]

I still think Daniel could sign a 2 year deal with McLaren, his stock is strong enough that he could take that risk, with an eye on Mercedes or Ferrari in 2021 if McLaren don’t become contenders in that time.

[the EDGE]

I still think Daniel could sign a 2 year deal with McLaren, his stock is strong enough that he could take that risk, with an eye on Mercedes or Ferrari in 2021 if McLaren don’t become contenders in that time.

He could, except Redbull have to be current 2021 title favourites right now, with the expected engine performance levelling. Don't they?

A shot at winning the title seems more important to him than money (personally i'd take the money but then i guess he already has plenty)

Don't get me wrong, its a long way off & McLaren have plenty of time to get their act together, but why piss of Rebull at this stage? if McLrean look like title contenders for 2021 i'm sure there would still be a seat for him