2022 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[PhillipM]

Rumour from the paddock is the numbers look good enough to chase Merc with a bit more setup work.

[Macklaren]

Rumour from the paddock is the numbers look good enough to chase Merc with a bit more setup work.

EXCELLENT! Merc admittedly underperforming a bit but if this is the trend post the summer break, I will happily take it

[Swed3121]

Rumour from the paddock is the numbers look good enough to chase Merc with a bit more setup work.

EXCELLENT! Merc admittedly underperforming a bit but this is the trend post the summer break, I will happily take it

If it does end up this way post summer , then it can almost 100% be blamed on the outright stubbornness of Mercedes and their flawed concept, every single other team has now adopted either a RB style pod or Ferrari style pod.

[PhillipM]

Pretty frustrating to see every team from Merc to AMR to AT to Williams bring big updates and we are the only ones saying that we cant afford to under the budget gap....sigh...

Aged well

[Mansell89]

Rumour from the paddock is the numbers look good enough to chase Merc with a bit more setup work.

Have to say the car looked better today. Handled neatly and speed trap was okay.

Glimmers of promise- as you say let’s see where it takes us when we dial it in

[_cerber1]

FP2 top speeds,

Aston Martin 322
Alfa Romeo 323
Alpine 323
Williams 325
Haas 326
McLaren 327
Mercedes 327
Alpha Tauri 329
Ferrari 329
Red Bull 333

[mclaren111]

I'm sure they were certainly looking at the regulations but I'm sure we analysing them too, so I'm not sure how much the other teams did, or didn't, get an advantage. Even Mercedes are pulling to the front and at one point they were right besides us. We had plenty of time to analyse the philosophy and make a choice with enough information that our designers needed. It just seems we made the wrong choice, but I don't think that is luck or even time, that was a decision based on our designers ability, experience and knowledge as much as anything and they fell a little short.

The way has been shown for them a little bit now, so hopefully they can use this years design lessons as a platform to push on strongly.

You are right… At the end, the team didn’t come up with the fastest model for these cars… I’m just saying that it isn’t surprising that those that had larger budgets, which in terms means more resources, are leading in terms of performance.

Been said that… I still believe that there is a lot more to these cars than what the fans “CFD” eyes perceive… It isn’t as simple as sometimes we make it out to be with simply interpreting that a particular shape of sidepod or tunnel entrance is responsible for performance… The best example of this has to be Aston Martin, who practically copied the RB18 and it’s not leading the midfield or close to the guys in the front using the same concept in terms of sidepod, tunnels, geometries, etc… On the same token, with a very different concept, the MCL36 has been competitive against the likes of Alpine that has a concept that follows a similar philosophy to the RBR and with a now a lot of influence from Ferrari.

I completely agree that some teams had an advantage but I'm not sure they were ploughing ahead and designing 3 cars at once at the end of 2019 and into 20, when Covid hit, aero development was locked down until Jan 21 and the factories shut for a few months for an early summer break. So I suspect that everyone had a look at the philosophy but didn't get the chance to get too far into it or at least not too much further than Mclaren.

Mclaren then shot themselves in the foot by continuing with the MCL35M when they should have focussed on this year and it is another example of poor effort from the team. What we have seen is a series of mistakes that have prevented us from being further ahead than I'd like.

It's a bad patch, compared to a few years of great work from the team, and I fully appreciate that the team have done a lot of good, but even though we are fighting for 4th, it is still a level or two down on where we were and I don't think it can be blamed on the budget, I do think the team have made poor decisions. But I'm not trying to bury them and I'm sure that they will come out of this strong.

Agree... Key said in a recent interview that work on MCL37 is well undeway...

[Emag]

My realistic expectations are that they at least pull themselves back to 2021 levels next year. Detached from the midfield with the occasional burst of pace to challenge at the front. Kind of like what Mercedes is right now. Which I guess depending on how Mercedes advances next year, it would still mean P4 in the constructors, but in terms of relative pace, that's a level I would be content with.

And it would also give me hopes for a proper return to the front in 2024, the first car which will be developed using all of the upgraded facilities.

[mwillems]

I hope so, I certainly think the tunnel and sim will help but they aren't the golden bullet and the whole team need to be on it from here on out.

In other news, Sainz will start from the back and Magnussen will be joining him, engine penalties for the both of them.

[Xero]

I hope so, I certainly think the tunnel and sim will help but they aren't the golden bullet and the whole team need to be on it from here on out.

In other news, Sainz will start from the back and Magnussen will be joining him, engine penalties for the both of them.

Even if Mercedes are down on power, their reliability has been relatively decent this season. Could be important if McLaren make a big step next season and are in the hunt for regular podiums.

For now, hard to gauge where they stand this weekend. Still chasing optimal setup as I type during FP3, so might not see the full picture until Hungary.

[mwillems]

I hope so, I certainly think the tunnel and sim will help but they aren't the golden bullet and the whole team need to be on it from here on out.

In other news, Sainz will start from the back and Magnussen will be joining him, engine penalties for the both of them.

Even if Mercedes are down on power, their reliability has been relatively decent this season. Could be important if McLaren make a big step next season and are in the hunt for regular podiums.

For now, hard to gauge where they stand this weekend. Still chasing optimal setup as I type during FP3, so might not see the full picture until Hungary.

In Landos interview on Formula1.com he seemed to give the feeling that the upgrade was OK but nothing special.

I know that the f1 upgrade form talked as much about changing the balance of the floors suction so I wonder if this was about unlocking more potential that the car has from the way it can be driven.

Looking at the onboards it seems the front is more responsive and glued so perhaps the strongest suction has been moved away from the rear and further forward.

I wonder what this means for the performance of both the drivers.

[billamend]

Around the same on sector 1, got much worse on sector 2, did not improve on sector 3.

On the update:

“It’s not as much as what I would dream of but yes, I don’t think we expected a lot of it,” said Norris of the update. “We expected a small step and it’s still too early to say. I’ve just driven it and things feel different – some things a little bit better and some things we have to optimise and figure out. But yes, reasonable.

“Daniel had it this morning for FP1, so he’s understood a little bit more. For me, I’ve still got to figure out how to drive the car because it’s a little bit different in that regard. I guess I’m playing a little bit of catch-up and trying to understand that compared to Daniel, but at the same time it’s been good, we’ve been able to compare data easily today because we chose that strategy of me not having it, him having it, and therefore we can look at the data tonight and extract more performance for tomorrow.”

Norris refrained from divulging how different the car felt to drive, but explained: “Just the slight feeling you get behind the wheel, you know? You’re so sensitive, you get so used to things, as soon as something feels just a little bit off, you have to figure out why that’s happening, what it’s doing, what the reasoning is for it and how to overcome it and maximise it again.

“It’s nothing good or bad, it’s just the limitation of the car is in different places throughout the corner and therefore you’ve got to adapt yourself to that.”

“[The parts] look different, don’t they? Yes, you feel it, but it’s also, we haven’t driven on this track yet as well with these cars so the reference [is] to another track, so I do feel some differences but it’s not like a back-to-back test if you will,” said Ricciardo.

“I think in the afternoon we made a bit of progress so that was better but I think there’s more to get out of it, so we’ll do some homework tonight – usual Friday night – but I think everything ran fairly smooth today so we got plenty of laps in and it wasn’t too hot in the car actually – it felt okay.

“On the long runs, I’m not really sure where we stand yet, I haven’t had a good look at that. I think I’m more worried about getting everything sorted from a set-up point of view and trying to understand that better after having had a whole day of running…”

[MrGapes]

https://preview.redd.it/2hrv546x7bd91.j ... 89fad7fb41

Around the same on sector 1, got much worse on sector 2, did not improve on sector 3.

On the update:

“It’s not as much as what I would dream of but yes, I don’t think we expected a lot of it,” said Norris of the update. “We expected a small step and it’s still too early to say. I’ve just driven it and things feel different – some things a little bit better and some things we have to optimise and figure out. But yes, reasonable.

“Daniel had it this morning for FP1, so he’s understood a little bit more. For me, I’ve still got to figure out how to drive the car because it’s a little bit different in that regard. I guess I’m playing a little bit of catch-up and trying to understand that compared to Daniel, but at the same time it’s been good, we’ve been able to compare data easily today because we chose that strategy of me not having it, him having it, and therefore we can look at the data tonight and extract more performance for tomorrow.”

Norris refrained from divulging how different the car felt to drive, but explained: “Just the slight feeling you get behind the wheel, you know? You’re so sensitive, you get so used to things, as soon as something feels just a little bit off, you have to figure out why that’s happening, what it’s doing, what the reasoning is for it and how to overcome it and maximise it again.

“It’s nothing good or bad, it’s just the limitation of the car is in different places throughout the corner and therefore you’ve got to adapt yourself to that.”

“[The parts] look different, don’t they? Yes, you feel it, but it’s also, we haven’t driven on this track yet as well with these cars so the reference [is] to another track, so I do feel some differences but it’s not like a back-to-back test if you will,” said Ricciardo.

“I think in the afternoon we made a bit of progress so that was better but I think there’s more to get out of it, so we’ll do some homework tonight – usual Friday night – but I think everything ran fairly smooth today so we got plenty of laps in and it wasn’t too hot in the car actually – it felt okay.

“On the long runs, I’m not really sure where we stand yet, I haven’t had a good look at that. I think I’m more worried about getting everything sorted from a set-up point of view and trying to understand that better after having had a whole day of running…”

Lando got blocked quite heavily in the last sector for his quali sim, so his last sector didnt improve, i expect it would be atleast 3-4 tenths faster - checked telemetry he lost 5-6 tenths

[CjC]

https://preview.redd.it/2hrv546x7bd91.j ... 89fad7fb41

Around the same on sector 1, got much worse on sector 2, did not improve on sector 3.

On the update:

“It’s not as much as what I would dream of but yes, I don’t think we expected a lot of it,” said Norris of the update. “We expected a small step and it’s still too early to say. I’ve just driven it and things feel different – some things a little bit better and some things we have to optimise and figure out. But yes, reasonable.

“Daniel had it this morning for FP1, so he’s understood a little bit more. For me, I’ve still got to figure out how to drive the car because it’s a little bit different in that regard. I guess I’m playing a little bit of catch-up and trying to understand that compared to Daniel, but at the same time it’s been good, we’ve been able to compare data easily today because we chose that strategy of me not having it, him having it, and therefore we can look at the data tonight and extract more performance for tomorrow.”

Norris refrained from divulging how different the car felt to drive, but explained: “Just the slight feeling you get behind the wheel, you know? You’re so sensitive, you get so used to things, as soon as something feels just a little bit off, you have to figure out why that’s happening, what it’s doing, what the reasoning is for it and how to overcome it and maximise it again.

“It’s nothing good or bad, it’s just the limitation of the car is in different places throughout the corner and therefore you’ve got to adapt yourself to that.”

“[The parts] look different, don’t they? Yes, you feel it, but it’s also, we haven’t driven on this track yet as well with these cars so the reference [is] to another track, so I do feel some differences but it’s not like a back-to-back test if you will,” said Ricciardo.

“I think in the afternoon we made a bit of progress so that was better but I think there’s more to get out of it, so we’ll do some homework tonight – usual Friday night – but I think everything ran fairly smooth today so we got plenty of laps in and it wasn’t too hot in the car actually – it felt okay.

“On the long runs, I’m not really sure where we stand yet, I haven’t had a good look at that. I think I’m more worried about getting everything sorted from a set-up point of view and trying to understand that better after having had a whole day of running…”

Lando got blocked quite heavily in the last sector for his quali sim, so his last sector didnt improve, i expect it would be atleast 3-4 tenths faster - checked telemetry he lost 5-6 tenths

So Lando should have been 8ths off the fastest?

[MrGapes]

https://preview.redd.it/2hrv546x7bd91.j ... 89fad7fb41

Around the same on sector 1, got much worse on sector 2, did not improve on sector 3.

On the update:

Lando got blocked quite heavily in the last sector for his quali sim, so his last sector didnt improve, i expect it would be atleast 3-4 tenths faster - checked telemetry he lost 5-6 tenths

So Lando should have been 8ths off the fastest?

yeah something like that, they are actually pretty competitive with the top teams and then they just lose a bunch of time in the last few corners in sector 3 to the front runners, guess that's the trade off for being draggy and having to run less wing.