2023 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[Ben1980]

Ok then explain how 11th and 18 isn't.

You can't. No one can.

Because the team made the decision to go down a different route. Meaning this car isn't necessarily how they want it.

Does that nake it a shitshow. Nope, not in my book.

But I'm not generally one for stupid overreaction after one qualifying session out of a 23 race season.

But I'm not an ex fan.

A team is only as good as its previous and current performance. Anything about the future isn't a given. Putting hope in that is what being a supporter and a fan is about but that should come along with being realistic about now. Otherwise it's faith. Tell me you have faith and watch me tear apart the whole concept of it.

PS you failed.

I have no idea if they will move up.

I still don't think an 11th place start is a shitshow.

But I don't do stupid overreactions, as mentioned.

I'm pretty realistic, and am fully aware that fighting for 4th over the season is the top level for the team. Hence, I don't think today was a shitshow.

[Stig14]

Ok then explain how 11th and 18 isn't.

You can't. No one can.

Because the team made the decision to go down a different route. Meaning this car isn't necessarily how they want it.

Does that nake it a shitshow. Nope, not in my book.

But I'm not generally one for stupid overreaction after one qualifying session out of a 23 race season.

But I'm not an ex fan.

A team is only as good as its previous and current performance. Anything about the future isn't a given. Putting hope in that is what being a supporter and a fan is about but that should come along with being realistic about now. Otherwise it's faith. Tell me you have faith and watch me tear apart the whole concept of it.

PS you failed.

Christ, this stream gets more and more polluted by pointless statements and personal arguing by the day.

No one is happy with a midfield car but we are where we are. No races have been run and no points awarded yet. Everyone needs to take a deep breath, calm down and support the team that we all want to see succeed (McLaren or otherwise). Criticising and saying the first quali of the year with a car the team accept is not the configuration they will be running at the end of the month is a "--- show" is simply unhelpful and adds nothing to the conversation.

PS- let's all not place too much faith on the Baku update. It will likely move them forward from where they are today and hopefully into 5th fastest. Let's not expect it to give anything more than that though given the spread in performance seen today.

[swifteddie1]

Quick Telemetry Analysis comparing the MCL60 and the MCL36… This time in Qualifying with the cars not hiding anything, of course usual caveats always apply in this type of comparisons, since Track Temperature, Wind (speed and direction) and Track Evolution are a factor… But I believe there are still some insights we can get from looking at it.

MCL60: Orange Trace
MCL36: White Trace

First a look at mini sectors during the lap to get a quick overview on where each car had an edge:

https://i.imgur.com/lCvnMS6.jpg

The results are as expected, the MCL60 has less drag than the MCL36 and is faster in the second half of the straights, difficult to tell if it’s only because of drag reduction or if improvements in the Mercedes PU play a larger factor.

On the main straight the MCL60 reaches 321 km/h while the MCL36 was capped at 313 km/h, a 7 km/h delta versus last year… But we do have the effect of the DRS that impacts the numbers and therefore a better section of the track to look at drag difference is in the last straight, here the MCL36 reaches a top speed of 287 km / h and at that point the MCL60 reaches 294 km/h, even though is the same delta as the main straight, interestingly the MCL60 maintains that Top Speed for longer, by the time Lando applies the brakes on the MCL60 it is still at 294km/h while the MCL36 was at 274km/h.

It is interesting also that even when the MCL60 is overall faster through the corners with higher minimum speeds (with the exception of T13) but the MCL36 has better corner exit out of them… This could be attributed also to a difference in the driving style needed for each car and torque / deployment strategies in the PU… What is clear is that Lando is capable of braking later in almost every braking zone and even though throttle application was slightly earlier in the MCL36, the difference is marginal.

Looking a bit into the difference in lap delta between the 2, it seems that Lando left at least 4 tenths on the table… Apparently he had an small mistake at the exit of T2 (forcing him to lift and correct), which cost him 2 tenths on the run to T4 and he also lost 2 tenths in the last corner, where he may have had too much braking input, extending his braking zone too deep and going through the corner 16km/h slower than in 2022

https://i.imgur.com/VijpACx.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/QUHfmvC.jpg

Overall the MCL60 is indeed an improvement over the MCL36 and arguably Lando missed Q3 due to a couple of mistakes more than just lack of pace from the car… But that’s easy to say sitting behind a keyboard

Great analysis. Interesting to see where the MCL60 out performs the MCL36. Thanks for putting this together.

[Slahinki]

I will say it again. I want the Baku B car to give the team such a huge leap to the top 3 so I can watch some here eat their own words.

I think we need to temper expectations on this Baku upgrade. The gap in Q2 to Alonso was 0.7 seconds. Do you really expect the upgrade to bring about a second in lap time? Because its going to take at least that because i do not imagine the other teams will not make improvements over the next two months.

It nice to see that we are not dead last and are in the lower half of the midfield, but its still quite a big gap all things considered.

Hoping the team can maximize the current package and maybe get a point or two there in the opening races but I fear it will become apparent that we need to focus on 2024 sooner rather than later.

Concerning quali pace, one thing to be said about the highlighted part is that we would need those 0.7s to catch up at at Bahrain, which was arguably the circuit the MCL36 was the worst at. We don't know yet what the gaps are going to be at other circuits, so we may not really need a full second from the updates in Baku to be able to challenge the front of the midfield/mix it with the lower top 3. But as with everything else, time will tell.

[organic]

So the car could've been in the mix for best of the rest with a better lap from Lando, and this is before the upgrades that they wanted to start with. Not so terrible.

[101FlyingDutchman]

Quick Telemetry Analysis comparing the MCL60 and the MCL36… This time in Qualifying with the cars not hiding anything, of course usual caveats always apply in this type of comparisons, since Track Temperature, Wind (speed and direction) and Track Evolution are a factor… But I believe there are still some insights we can get from looking at it.

MCL60: Orange Trace
MCL36: White Trace

First a look at mini sectors during the lap to get a quick overview on where each car had an edge:

https://i.imgur.com/lCvnMS6.jpg

The results are as expected, the MCL60 has less drag than the MCL36 and is faster in the second half of the straights, difficult to tell if it’s only because of drag reduction or if improvements in the Mercedes PU play a larger factor.

On the main straight the MCL60 reaches 321 km/h while the MCL36 was capped at 313 km/h, a 7 km/h delta versus last year… But we do have the effect of the DRS that impacts the numbers and therefore a better section of the track to look at drag difference is in the last straight, here the MCL36 reaches a top speed of 287 km / h and at that point the MCL60 reaches 294 km/h, even though is the same delta as the main straight, interestingly the MCL60 maintains that Top Speed for longer, by the time Lando applies the brakes on the MCL60 it is still at 294km/h while the MCL36 was at 274km/h.

It is interesting also that even when the MCL60 is overall faster through the corners with higher minimum speeds (with the exception of T13) but the MCL36 has better corner exit out of them… This could be attributed also to a difference in the driving style needed for each car and torque / deployment strategies in the PU… What is clear is that Lando is capable of braking later in almost every braking zone and even though throttle application was slightly earlier in the MCL36, the difference is marginal.

Looking a bit into the difference in lap delta between the 2, it seems that Lando left at least 4 tenths on the table… Apparently he had an small mistake at the exit of T2 (forcing him to lift and correct), which cost him 2 tenths on the run to T4 and he also lost 2 tenths in the last corner, where he may have had too much braking input, extending his braking zone too deep and going through the corner 16km/h slower than in 2022

https://i.imgur.com/VijpACx.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/QUHfmvC.jpg

Overall the MCL60 is indeed an improvement over the MCL36 and arguably Lando missed Q3 due to a couple of mistakes more than just lack of pace from the car… But that’s easy to say sitting behind a keyboard

Thanks for doing exactly as you promised. Much appreciated mate. big thumbs up

[SmallSoldier]

It would be interesting to also look at McLaren versus their midfield rivals to try to understand where the strengths and weaknesses are against them… Won’t try to go into too much detail and highlight what seems to be the key aspects against each:

“All Laps will be their best attempt in Q2, since it would be the most representative and of course the faster driver of each team”

McLaren vs Alpine:

There is not a big discrepancy in regards to drag between both Teams, in the main straight and with DRS both Teams had the same top speed, the Alpine seemed to have had a better exit out the last corner in their fast lap since they are ahead of McLaren by 5 Km/h at the start of their flying lap, but by the end of the straight they both have the same speed… Without DRS, the Alpine does show less drag and achieves 3 km/h more top speed (297 vs 294).

The Alpine does have better cornering speed than the MCL60, achieving a higher minimum speed, but it is in 2 corners where the lap goes in favor to Alpine, T4 and T14 are where the 4 tenths difference between them is created with the McLaren faster in the middle sector by a tenth.

The MCL60 also brakes later than the A523 throughout the lap, throttle application is fairly similar with both





McLaren vs Alfa Romeo:

This time we have Bottas vs Lando, pretty evenly match with Lando beating Bottas by less than a tenth at the end of the lap, but if my assumption that Lando made mistakes in both T2 and T14 is correct, the gap would have about 4 tenth since Lando loses a 0.15 in the run to T4 and 0.25 in the T14.

Looking at the Telemetry it was interesting to note that there is a drag deficit against the Alfa Romeo, with the difference in top speed negligible between both teams in both the main straight with DRS and in the last straight without it.

In regards to cornering speed, the MCL60 has an advantage, but mainly due to Lando having more entry speed than Bottas, this may be more a function of driving style than the car itself, since Bottas seems to favor an slow in - fast out approach… While Lando brakes later in every corner, Bottas recovers most of the time lost on corner exit which seems to indicate great traction from the Alfa Romeo since throttle application isn’t that similar between the two.

Once again, the MCL60 has an edge in the middle sector, creating enough delta to keep the lead even when losing a quarter of the second in the last corner:





McLaren vs Haas:

Hulk had a fantastic lap in Q2 (faster than his fastest lap in Q3), the Haas actually ending Q2 more than half a second faster than the McLaren… But the gap isn’t created on the straights… Even though the Haas is slightly faster than the McLaren, it is only 2 km/h faster in both the Main Straight and the run to T14, for example the Haas gains half a tenth in the last straight due to drag difference (and maybe a bit more power from the Ferrari engine).

We can see once again how much impact T2 had, Lando was up 0.14 exiting T1 and ends up 0.09 behind before T4… Losing roughly 2 and a half tenths that section alone… But the gap is really created in the approach to T9 - T10 where Hulk edges Lando by 3 and a half tenths in the short run from T8 to T10

McLaren (or Lando) once again show better braking performance, braking later into almost every corner with similar cornering speed from both with exception of T10 and T14. With throttle application fairly similar between them.





McLaren vs Aston Martin:

Even though the AMR (especially in the hands of Alonso) was in a different league in Bahrain, thought looking at their telemetry would be interesting!

Keeping the same format, let’s look at Top Speed / Drag for both cars (on the same engine)… Contrary to popular believe the MCL60 isn’t much draggier than the AMR23… Alonso edged Lando by only 1 km/h in both the main straight and the run to T14, so with and without DRS both cars carry a similar amount of drag!

So, where do the massive 7 tenths difference between them comes from?… Its grip, by the time they reach T4 Alonso is up by 0.14 seconds on Lando and actually between T4 and T8, Lando has the edge through the fast S’s section of the track… But Alonso pulls (similar to Hulk) 3 tenths on Lando in just the run from T8 and braking into T10… The gap is maintained until T13 where a better exit nets Alonso another tenth on Lando and seals the deal in T14 pulling another 2 tenths on Lando.





My take and maybe a TL/DR: McLaren isn’t the draggy car everyone makes it to be, if it has a deficit against it’s rivals is relatively small and not the reason for the lack of performance in Bahrain

[SmallSoldier]

Quick Telemetry Analysis comparing the MCL60 and the MCL36… This time in Qualifying with the cars not hiding anything, of course usual caveats always apply in this type of comparisons, since Track Temperature, Wind (speed and direction) and Track Evolution are a factor… But I believe there are still some insights we can get from looking at it.

MCL60: Orange Trace
MCL36: White Trace

First a look at mini sectors during the lap to get a quick overview on where each car had an edge:

https://i.imgur.com/lCvnMS6.jpg

The results are as expected, the MCL60 has less drag than the MCL36 and is faster in the second half of the straights, difficult to tell if it’s only because of drag reduction or if improvements in the Mercedes PU play a larger factor.

On the main straight the MCL60 reaches 321 km/h while the MCL36 was capped at 313 km/h, a 7 km/h delta versus last year… But we do have the effect of the DRS that impacts the numbers and therefore a better section of the track to look at drag difference is in the last straight, here the MCL36 reaches a top speed of 287 km / h and at that point the MCL60 reaches 294 km/h, even though is the same delta as the main straight, interestingly the MCL60 maintains that Top Speed for longer, by the time Lando applies the brakes on the MCL60 it is still at 294km/h while the MCL36 was at 274km/h.

It is interesting also that even when the MCL60 is overall faster through the corners with higher minimum speeds (with the exception of T13) but the MCL36 has better corner exit out of them… This could be attributed also to a difference in the driving style needed for each car and torque / deployment strategies in the PU… What is clear is that Lando is capable of braking later in almost every braking zone and even though throttle application was slightly earlier in the MCL36, the difference is marginal.

Looking a bit into the difference in lap delta between the 2, it seems that Lando left at least 4 tenths on the table… Apparently he had an small mistake at the exit of T2 (forcing him to lift and correct), which cost him 2 tenths on the run to T4 and he also lost 2 tenths in the last corner, where he may have had too much braking input, extending his braking zone too deep and going through the corner 16km/h slower than in 2022

https://i.imgur.com/VijpACx.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/QUHfmvC.jpg

Overall the MCL60 is indeed an improvement over the MCL36 and arguably Lando missed Q3 due to a couple of mistakes more than just lack of pace from the car… But that’s easy to say sitting behind a keyboard

Thanks for doing exactly as you promised. Much appreciated mate. big thumbs up

Hope you like the one against the rivals

I draw an interesting (although probably wrong) conclusion!

[Stig14]

It would be interesting to also look at McLaren versus their midfield rivals to try to understand where the strengths and weaknesses are against them… Won’t try to go into too much detail and highlight what seems to be the key aspects against each:

“All Laps will be their best attempt in Q2, since it would be the most representative and of course the faster driver of each team”

McLaren vs Alpine:

There is not a big discrepancy in regards to drag between both Teams, in the main straight and with DRS both Teams had the same top speed, the Alpine seemed to have had a better exit out the last corner in their fast lap since they are ahead of McLaren by 5 Km/h at the start of their flying lap, but by the end of the straight they both have the same speed… Without DRS, the Alpine does show less drag and achieves 3 km/h more top speed (297 vs 294).

The Alpine does have better cornering speed than the MCL60, achieving a higher minimum speed, but it is in 2 corners where the lap goes in favor to Alpine, T4 and T14 are where the 4 tenths difference between them is created with the McLaren faster in the middle sector by a tenth.

The MCL60 also brakes later than the A523 throughout the lap, throttle application is fairly similar with both

https://i.imgur.com/qD3woIc.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/e2hFXLq.jpg

McLaren vs Alfa Romeo:

This time we have Bottas vs Lando, pretty evenly match with Lando beating Bottas by less than a tenth at the end of the lap, but if my assumption that Lando made mistakes in both T2 and T14 is correct, the gap would have about 4 tenth since Lando loses a 0.15 in the run to T4 and 0.25 in the T14.

Looking at the Telemetry it was interesting to note that there is a drag deficit against the Alfa Romeo, with the difference in top speed negligible between both teams in both the main straight with DRS and in the last straight without it.

In regards to cornering speed, the MCL60 has an advantage, but mainly due to Lando having more entry speed than Bottas, this may be more a function of driving style than the car itself, since Bottas seems to favor an slow in - fast out approach… While Lando brakes later in every corner, Bottas recovers most of the time lost on corner exit which seems to indicate great traction from the Alfa Romeo since throttle application isn’t that similar between the two.

Once again, the MCL60 has an edge in the middle sector, creating enough delta to keep the lead even when losing a quarter of the second in the last corner:

https://i.imgur.com/FowGuBn.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/pBg1VGg.jpg

McLaren vs Haas:

Hulk had a fantastic lap in Q2 (faster than his fastest lap in Q3), the Haas actually ending Q2 more than half a second faster than the McLaren… But the gap isn’t created on the straights… Even though the Haas is slightly faster than the McLaren, it is only 2 km/h faster in both the Main Straight and the run to T14, for example the Haas gains half a tenth in the last straight due to drag difference (and maybe a bit more power from the Ferrari engine).

We can see once again how much impact T2 had, Lando was up 0.14 exiting T1 and ends up 0.09 behind before T4… Losing roughly 2 and a half tenths that section alone… But the gap is really created in the approach to T9 - T10 where Hulk edges Lando by 3 and a half tenths in the short run from T8 to T10

McLaren (or Lando) once again show better braking performance, braking later into almost every corner with similar cornering speed from both with exception of T10 and T14. With throttle application fairly similar between them.

https://i.imgur.com/vAj6OyV.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/M6CDc6o.jpg

McLaren vs Aston Martin:

Even though the AMR (especially in the hands of Alonso) was in a different league in Bahrain, thought looking at their telemetry would be interesting!

Keeping the same format, let’s look at Top Speed / Drag for both cars (on the same engine)… Contrary to popular believe the MCL60 isn’t much draggier than the AMR23… Alonso edged Lando by only 1 km/h in both the main straight and the run to T14, so with and without DRS both cars carry a similar amount of drag!

So, where do the massive 7 tenths difference between them comes from?… Its grip, by the time they reach T4 Alonso is up by 0.14 seconds on Lando and actually between T4 and T8, Lando has the edge through the fast S’s section of the track… But Alonso pulls (similar to Hulk) 3 tenths on Lando in just the run from T8 and braking into T10… The gap is maintained until T13 where a better exit nets Alonso another tenth on Lando and seals the deal in T14 pulling another 2 tenths on Lando.

https://i.imgur.com/wabO0BV.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/wDALUD0.jpg

My take and maybe a TL/DR: McLaren isn’t the draggy car everyone makes it to be, if it has a deficit against it’s rivals is relatively small and not the reason for the lack of performance in Bahrain

Fantastic analysis- thanks SS

It certainly seems to be marginal gains in a few areas according to those figures as oppose to a massive loss on braking/high speed cornering/straights etc.

[SmallSoldier]

So the car could've been in the mix for best of the rest with a better lap from Lando, and this is before the upgrades that they wanted to start with. Not so terrible.

Nailing the perfect lap is a tall ask… But there was definitely time lost in those 2 events alone that could have yielded 4 more tenths everything else remaining the same… I wouldn’t blame Lando, but the car had a little bit more in it, that’s for sure

[organic]

[McL-H]

After the performance at the test last week and all predictions out there, I’ll take 11th. With the great analysis from Soldier showing there was more performance left on the table, the prospect is even better. It’s really not that bad and with the Baku update incoming I hope we will be able to challenge Mercedes for 4th this season. Especially with Mercedes admitting they are abandoning ship and will likely introduce a B-car themselves. As that will probably take them longer to introduce and we’ll probably not see much updates on their current concept anymore, it means we’ll be a step ahead of them with our own B-car. The future is looking bright again.

One thing I noticed are the screens on the car during Q. Last year they were only there during the practice sessions, due to the extra weight. They weigh 190 grams each. The team running them during Q now, does that mean we no longer have any weight issues with the car? And if so, wouldn’t it be better to add ballast as low as possible in the car rather than on the upside of the car?

[deadhead]

Feel bad for Norris having to fight in the midfield, hopefully they can bring things together for next year.. would love to see what he can do in a top car.

[swifteddie1]

My take and maybe a TL/DR: McLaren isn’t the draggy car everyone makes it to be, if it has a deficit against it’s rivals is relatively small and not the reason for the lack of performance in Bahrain

Would this be down to aero efficiency? In that the AM can produce higher downforce with lower drag but the MCL60 cannot.

[SmallSoldier]

My take and maybe a TL/DR: McLaren isn’t the draggy car everyone makes it to be, if it has a deficit against it’s rivals is relatively small and not the reason for the lack of performance in Bahrain

Would this be down to aero efficiency? In that the AM can produce higher downforce with lower drag but the MCL60 cannot.

From what I could read from the data, the AM creates more downforce for the same amount of drag as the MCL60… So yes, the AMR23 is more aero efficient than the MCL60… But even then, I don’t think that the gap in Downforce is that big between them. It could be seeing in the comparison with Stroll (we have to be careful with an Stroll comparison, first weekend in the car and broken wrists (how fair could it be?), but it can still give us clues:

Lando loses 0.25 between T2 and T4 to Stroll… Keeps losing some time from T4 until T5, but actually gains 3 tenths against him from T5 all the way to T13… We can once again see the deficit in T14, which makes him lose 0.29 in that sector alone… In the DF sections of the track, the MCL60 was actually faster: