2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[Macklaren]

I really think everyone is Monday morning quarterbacking this one. While mistakes were made yesterday, it was far from clear what the optimal strategy was given the rapidly changing conditions. Also what killed the race is Lando's bad last stop (which was his fault though this happens in the wet) and likely the lack of front wing adjustment which killed the Softs.

Hopefully, all these disappointments are making Lando and the team tougher and more experienced. Stella's interview this morning was a great read

what do you think of the double-stack miss ? Surely that can't be a 'marginal call' like the used S v/s new M tyre drama, was it ? Shafting Piastri's race with an extra inter lap on a dry track, instead of sacrificing 2-3s by making him wait in the pitlane -- that was stupid, because they could see how the laptimes were dropping, every successive lap was 3s slower. then 4s slower as the rain came down. The extra lap Piastri stayed out, he was 8s slower relative to the guys who by then were already on slicks. If a professional race team goofs up and misses that info, while people watching with TV subscription don't, it's inexcusable. How much time loss did they guesstimate about that extra Piastri lap ? 2s ? Because the previous laps were like +3, +4 seconds.

McLaren deserve every bit of criticism for f&&&king Piastri over. In yet another race.

If you were listening to the radio at the time, Lando did not want to come in. Thought he could keep going because it was still not crazy wet. The team forcibly called him in because they knew what was coming. So keeping Oscar out another lap wasn't as obviously wrong as the pundits think..parts of the tech were still pretty dry. He would have probably lost 2 positions in the pit lane anyway and people would have been saying why didn't McLaren keep him out when it was not bucketing.

Also, like I said, mistakes were made. But I don't think it was as obvious/stupid as to say everyone watching knew the right thing to do.

[Macklaren]

I really think everyone is Monday morning quarterbacking this one. While mistakes were made yesterday, it was far from clear what the optimal strategy was given the rapidly changing conditions. Also what killed the race is Lando's bad last stop (which was his fault though this happens in the wet) and likely the lack of front wing adjustment which killed the Softs.

Hopefully, all these disappointments are making Lando and the team tougher and more experienced. Stella's interview this morning was a great read

Please can you share the interview?

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/why- ... /10633007/

[Marc.W]

So, yesterday could have been much better, I personally think that they need to not give Lando so much choice in instances like yesterday, we knew from the long run pace that the medium was going to be the tyre for the race and they allowed Lando to choose a used soft over a new medium?! The engineer/strategist should be making a no questions call in that situation, not giving it to a driver who can only see the small picture.

Regarding Oscar, I'm disappointed in the team because it felt like they were doing everything they could to give Lando the win rather than trying to score the maximum points they could, Oscar had mega pace at the end on the mediums, if they hadn't have left him out for another lap he probably would have won that race.

[ScottR267]

[FittingMechanics]

I really think everyone is Monday morning quarterbacking this one. While mistakes were made yesterday, it was far from clear what the optimal strategy was given the rapidly changing conditions. Also what killed the race is Lando's bad last stop (which was his fault though this happens in the wet) and likely the lack of front wing adjustment which killed the Softs.

Hopefully, all these disappointments are making Lando and the team tougher and more experienced. Stella's interview this morning was a great read

I disagree. While some calls were hard to get right, some were extremely obvious.

It was extremely obvious that not double stacking was a mistake. They could see that Verstappen was much faster by going a lap earlier and thus, it is easy to conclude that Piastri would lose more than 5 seconds by staying out (not to mention the risk of him crashing out). I am completely fine with them "missing" the exact moment to double stack as that was hard to do and Verstappen was behind top 4 with little to lose. But double stack was a clear call.

Second clear mistake was not putting Norris on mediums. They obviously chose to bring two mediums and a hard (for a usually 1 stop race), they talked about the medium over the radio yet they laid it onto Norris to try and pick the right tire in the middle of the race with misleading "cover Hamilton or cover Verstappen" comment. This was a mistake.

I also think that they could and should have figured out the timing for the pitstop, other cars were switching onto softs. I think they were once again defensive and reactive but I can understand why.

Norris sliding on the wet pitbox to lose 2 more seconds didn't help.

[venkyhere]

Second clear mistake was not putting Norris on mediums. They obviously chose to bring two mediums and a hard (for a usually 1 stop race), they talked about the medium over the radio yet they laid it onto Norris to try and pick the right tire in the middle of the race with misleading "cover Hamilton or cover Verstappen" comment. This was a mistake.

Agree that the way his race engineer composed the message to Lando, was in itself a loaded question. It was 'do you want to go for a win or happy with 2nd ?' Obviously the driver will choose the win.
But I dont think we should 'blame' McLaren for this call. Inherently their car is kinder to tyres than any other car on the grid, so expecting the used S to last for 12 laps AND be quick wasn't a bad estimation, esp since Hamilton was on same tyre. As I mentioned before, despite all the prediction algorithms and tools at their disposal that crunches the numbers and presents them with live info 'what tyre now' final choice (after they plug in the laptimes of themselves from the weekend on same compound fuel corrected, the laptimes of other representative teams on the same compound from the same race that's ongoing, the data about the tyre from pirelli, the track temp data etc etc) .

The data from pirelli that shows X tyre is faster than Y tyre by 0.zz seconds, is based on peak grip at some fixed temp. The 'average laptime' (that will again depend on the car, how much aero load it has, how much slip angle the tyres suffer in average over a lap) etc are all in the territory of 'algorithms' as they must be calculating the 'average grip' over a stint. So if their tools are telling them used S for 12 laps has better average laptime than fresh M, we can't fault the pitcrew for relaying this info via race engineer to the driver.

It's not an exact science, so the 'feel' from the driver matters and that's why they even ask the driver, who can make a subjective 'gut feel' call on this. And hence the loaded question by his race engineer. For Mercedes, their algorithms told the used S is the one to go for rather than a fresh H - but look what happened with Redbull, their tools told them fresh H is the one to go instead of used S. So there is a lot of 'does it suit that particular car' involved.

That's why a generic 'how come they didn't know used S was slower than harder compounds, other teams knew' is off the mark I think. The team knew anyway that it was a marginal call, and tyre grip prediction is not something exact, like downforce number at a particular speed.

Plus, on top of all this, there is a huge dependency on how the driver uses the newly fitted tyre on his outlap. I think Lando took a lot of life out of the used S on his outlap, he was blisteringly fast.

According to me, this was not the 'big blunder' that the internet should be blaming them for.
The big blunder was of course, leaving Piastri out to the wolves, because there was no ambiguity in the data, it was crystal clear that every progressive lap was losing more and more laptime.

[PapayaFan481]

Bono is not going to Ferrari with Lewis is he? I wonder whether he could be tempted to come to McLaren to oversee the race engineers....

[BMMR61]

Three stinking errors by the team over the weekend.
1. Sending Oscar out at the back of the queue for the last run in Q3
2. Not double stacking the change to intermediates
3. Not insisting Lando run the new mediums for the final 10 laps.

1. didn't turn out to be an issue due to the arrival of the first shower helping Oscar pass three cars and threaten to take the lead from Lando just as the rain started to fall.
2. rookie error, mini sector times were proof that major time loss was being made due to the slippery conditions
3. slightly more nuanced decision but only just. Driver reaction in the cool down room was the expert opinion. Will needs to take greater leadership over Lando.

Time for Zak to call Mika for a drivers briefing at MTC, a very smart double WDC who still knows what's going on. Lando in particular needs some mental assistance to achieve his potential, Oscar less so, he's a machine and will work it out very soon.

[ScottR267]

Bono is not going to Ferrari with Lewis is he? I wonder whether he could be tempted to come to McLaren to oversee the race engineers....

He’s been at Brackley since the Honda days. If he doesn’t follow Lewis to Ferrari I can’t see him leaving Mercedes unfortunately

[haza]

Finally caught up on the race and once again another race McLaren could have won I’m not gonna sit here and bash them but it’s clear McLaren although they have a quick car are making a few rookie mistakes as a team I think a lot of it is adjusting to being a top tier team which they haven’t been for quite some time they will adapt an iron out these little niggles with strategy and decisions but I think patience is the game atm no point shouting the choking card McLaren have far exceeded there own expectations this year they didn’t expect to be in title contention till next year yet they’re already there now once they adjust to being a top tier team again they’ll be able to maximise the result come race weekend

[Macklaren]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/exac ... /10633232/

Painful

[Marc.W]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/exac ... /10633232/

Painful

Coulda woulda shoulda, Red Bull could have won the constructors by now if they had have finished 1-2 every race /s

--- happens, as long as they learn, and take measures so it doesn't happen again, or has much less likelihood of it happening again then all is good.

[Huggles]

Three stinking errors by the team over the weekend.
1. Sending Oscar out at the back of the queue for the last run in Q3
2. Not double stacking the change to intermediates
3. Not insisting Lando run the new mediums for the final 10 laps.

1. didn't turn out to be an issue due to the arrival of the first shower helping Oscar pass three cars and threaten to take the lead from Lando just as the rain started to fall.
2. rookie error, mini sector times were proof that major time loss was being made due to the slippery conditions
3. slightly more nuanced decision but only just. Driver reaction in the cool down room was the expert opinion. Will needs to take greater leadership over Lando.

Time for Zak to call Mika for a drivers briefing at MTC, a very smart double WDC who still knows what's going on. Lando in particular needs some mental assistance to achieve his potential, Oscar less so, he's a machine and will work it out very soon.

I believe the lap before he pitted Lando ran wide and turned a 3/4 second lead on Piastri to .5 sec, which compromised the double stack.

[Ben1980]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/exac ... /10633232/

Painful

Painful article. Not sure what they have said are mistakes. Lando being taken out by Max can't be a mistake.

[AR3-GP]

Does anyone remember the Dutch GP last year where after starting P2 on the grid, Norris/Mclaren stayed out a lap too long on slicks in the rain dropping them well down the order? Russia 2021. Mclaren keeps saying they are learning, but they aren't showing that they are learning. This weekend is not the first time that they faced these challenges.