2019 Mclaren F1 Team - Renault

[Darth-Piekus]

All I can say is people should cheer up cause I see people not satisfied. We are moving on the right way for once after all these bad years and I have a pretty good feeling we are faster than we look.

[mwillems]

Pace is reasonable, car seems reliable. It's almost impossible to baseline testing times. I don't think it is possible to come away from the first weeks test and for us spectators to see anything more than that.

It's the best testing session for a while and on top of that, you get the distinct impression that there is an ethos in the team to get heads down, be humble and to drive the development of the car forward. They might well be fifth or sixth fastest, but now I feel like if they are, they can focus and turn it around.

Hopefully we will see new parts next week.

[Ground Effect]

They were running a little late with parts for the car as it was so it might not have all the bits until the actual race weekend anyway.

I hope they do show up with their planned Melbourne spec, it would be great to have the car as you want it when you want it. I think Renault have done a decent job. Ricciardo said they're running pretty conservative, I'm assuming McLaren would run same way

[Darth-Piekus]

Question. When people are mentioning specs do they mean different Front and Rear Wings, Badgeboards and Body Parts? Are we gonna see a different car in appearance in Melbourne?

[GoranF1]

Usualy its a bit easier to draw conclusions after test 2. ATM its really difficult to predict anything except that Ferrari and Mercedes are ahead. I think Helmut Marko is full of --- and RB is clearly behind. It looks like Renault and Alfa are quite close to Redbull.
Mclaren is somewhere in a group whit Stroll racing, TR and Haas.
Williams is clearly behind.

[Enstone]

All I can say is people should cheer up cause I see people not satisfied. We are moving on the right way for once after all these bad years and I have a pretty good feeling we are faster than we look.

I have this feeling too.
But feel a bit frustrated because they don't have push the limits today, i'm pretty sure they can do arround 1,17s with C5 tyres on a hot lap !
Battle will be intense between : McLaren/Haas/Sauber i think !

[RonDennis]

Pace is reasonable, car seems reliable. It's almost impossible to baseline testing times. I don't think it is possible to come away from the first weeks test and for us spectators to see anything more than that.

It's the best testing session for a while and on top of that, you get the distinct impression that there is an ethos in the team to get heads down, be humble and to drive the development of the car forward. They might well be fifth or sixth fastest, but now I feel like if they are, they can focus and turn it around.

Hopefully we will see new parts next week.

Exactly, I already love that I don't hear Boullier about aiming for podiums or whatever.

[FittingMechanics]

Usualy its a bit easier to draw conclusions after test 2. ATM its really difficult to predict anything except that Ferrari and Mercedes are ahead. I think Helmut Marko is full of --- and RB is clearly behind. It looks like Renault and Alfa are quite close to Redbull.
Mclaren is somewhere in a group whit Stroll racing, TR and Haas.
Williams is clearly behind.

Good analysis though after seeing Lando's race sim, I'd say McLaren is in upper midfield along with Renault/Alfa. I'm still waiting on Soymotor releasing stint data to compare race sims.

[Big Tea]

Any whispers of Mclaren doing anything 'strange' with the suspension?

I did not see much, but it did seem to be moving the weight forward under brakes. Added to Lando's strange off earlier I wonder if they are 'doing' something?

But then, thats what testing is for isnt it?

[GoranF1]

Any whispers of Mclaren doing anything 'strange' with the suspension?

I did not see much, but it did seem to be moving the weight forward under brakes. Added to Lando's strange off earlier I wonder if they are 'doing' something?

But then, thats what testing is for isnt it?

That was quite strange spun...and testing rig was on at the moment of the incident, they were testing something, possibly air flow at ride height changes?

[Jackles-UK]

Mclaren’s harder tyre long runs look promising, hopefully that points to a retention of one of the few redeeming features of the MCL33 on being kind on its tyres. Not setting any laps on the C5 tyres (I think?) seemed like a disappointment but I think it actually bodes well for two reasons:

1. Focusing on long runs could have allowed them to more accurately measure race parameters (tyre wear, fuel consumption, temperatures, DRS effectiveness, pit stop procedures etc.) which can only be of benefit. Having 450-odd laps of data to help verify their models on CFD will be useful too given the disaster they had with that last year!

2. Leaving the low fuel/soft tyre runs (which every team will inevitably want to do at some point) for test 2 says to me that there could be a significant amount of new parts coming. Once the car more closely resembles what they will bring to Melbourne then they can start chasing the raw pace on low fuel/soft tyres.

[ScottR267]

Does anyone know which fuel supplier McLaren went with in the end? Did they go with Petrobras or stick with Castrol?

[Bisonas]

All I can say is people should cheer up cause I see people not satisfied. We are moving on the right way for once after all these bad years and I have a pretty good feeling we are faster than we look.

I have this feeling too.
But feel a bit frustrated because they don't have push the limits today, i'm pretty sure they can do arround 1,17s with C5 tyres on a hot lap !
Battle will be intense between : McLaren/Haas/Sauber i think !

Mario Isola from pirelli said:
"Plus the C5 is not the compound for this circuit, so the C5 struggles a little bit to guarantee a very fast lap.
"Also, one lap is difficult to achieve with the C5 in Barcelona, considering the circuit is more aggressive and the Tarmac is rougher than one year ago."

So C5 its not guaranteed that it will be faster than C4 on a very low fuel qualy run.
There is a chance that the C5 will lose performance before the end of that lap.
It depends on many things ofc, as track temperature etc etc, but you can see that the C5 its on the limit for Barcelona.

It will be interesting to see next week who can actually extract the most performance from the C5, because that would mean that the car that managed it, is more kind to the tires than others.

[max_speed]

Biggest positive for me is :

However, Lando Norris, McLaren's newest highly-rated rookie, completed a 26-lap race stint on the final day of testing on the C1 compound tyre (the hardest available to the teams). The times that he achieved were not only consistent but competitive, lapping in the 1:23's on average.

[Maritimer]

Question. When people are mentioning specs do they mean different Front and Rear Wings, Badgeboards and Body Parts? Are we gonna see a different car in appearance in Melbourne?

Yes, usually the aero surfaces are updated after testing and new iterations/designs appear in Australia. The wings and bargeboards that are on the cars now were designed a few months ago so the teams are now learning what needs to be altered to optimize the car.