2023 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[CjC]

McLaren still “pretty terrible” in low speed, says Norris

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/-mcla ... /10494237/

[Emag]

McLaren still “pretty terrible” in low speed, says Norris

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/-mcla ... /10494237/

Sector 1 was visibly weaker compared to RedBull and Mercedes. Entry into T3 wasn't that bad, but T4 wasn't good at all and that compromises the hangar straight as well. If they were competitive in those type of corners, they would have fought for the win in Silverstone.

It felt like it wasn't that bad in the last chicane, but that's a corner complex that comes before a big breaking zone, whereas in T4 you sort of carry the speed from T3 with very little braking. So I guess that's the main weakness. Low-medium speed corners in which you need to carry the speed and not the ones that come from a big braking zone.

[Balalu]

McLaren still “pretty terrible” in low speed, says Norris

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/-mcla ... /10494237/

Are those weaknesses mechanical related? Could the mechanical upgrades be targeting just that?

[geogate]

Dont think RBR are after Lando right now. It's Piastri they are sniffing around

[elldizzle]

People have short memories about Hungary last year. If we assume our weakneses in this car are carried over from last year. Lando Qualified 4th last year.. So maybe we wont be so bad.

[geogate]

I think Hungary may depend on track temp - cooler the better for us, but Hungary can get pretty darn warm

[chrisc90]

From watching the onboard of Max, the rear of Lando's car looked a little twitchy on acceleration out of the corners. Whether thats down to the car, or the fact Lando was pushing to build a gap to Max is another thing. Would be worth watching Russel behind Oscar to see if was the same.

[MTudor]

This will be a long one
I heard last night on Peter Windsor's podcast that the call to put Lando&Oscar on hards was Zak's,nowidk if he was kidding or not but he(Zak) wax a racer and maybe he was thinking:'What would I do in this case'?
Do you think that Zak could have made the decision all by himself or Windsor exagerated p?
At the cut off point for the next alocation in the wind tunnel/CFD Mclaren was behind Alpine so we will have a double advantage,we are going to use more wind/tunnel time and we will no longer waste time on the road to Cologne.
After the Sakir quali the difference between RBR and Mclaren was 2.2s and now there was just under 0.3s,that is a MASSIVE diference that use to be recouped in the aspirated engines era not in the hybrid era with restrictions on testing,wind tunnel,CFD,finances,so this is a MEGA JOB by the team.

[Mostlyeels]

Because I find it unlikely that the car can run 25-30 laps on Mediums full of fuel and then fail to run 15 on softs empty. Zak said that it was borderline call so we're not that off. I bet that in the coming races we will see that the car is fine with tire usage and that this was an overly cautious call. Lando seems to think so too.

But let's assume I am wrong, I still feel that going the same way with both cars (and both against the other teams) was a mistake. They could have split strategy and it would be safer for the team.

Verstappen was struggling with the Softs before the end of the race, they delivered the result… They may know more than you (or I) what the right tire was, I mean maybe they know a little bit more than we do.

In any case, no point in debating opinions… In my opinion, is silly to argue against a decision made based in a lot of data, lap time simulation, etc, but maybe they should scrap all that and run it by feeling, who knows

It worked out fine, so what can we say?

You do wonder though, if Hamilton had got past early on (and it was not just the speed of the car but Lando's perfect defensive driving that prevented that), his tyres would not have cooked and he'd then be defending from Lando and who knows what would have happened, my view is we had a good chance to get him back as his used tyres neared the end of the life as I stated in the race. This to me suggests how close it was between the Hards and the Softs. I also don't know how many laps those used had on them.

The app showed 3 laps on Hamilton's softs. The longevity of the softs was pretty nuts during the race, but obviously Hamilton had to push quite a lot more at the end than regular race pace. It seemed like, after a couple of laps of backing off to cool them, he was able to push back up to ~1.5s from Lando, but I reckon that was probably the limit of the softs.

Lando's defending was superb. So great to see.

[Ground Effect]

This will be a long one
I heard last night on Peter Windsor's podcast that the call to put Lando&Oscar on hards was Zak's,nowidk if he was kidding or not but he(Zak) wax a racer and maybe he was thinking:'What would I do in this case'?
Do you think that Zak could have made the decision all by himself or Windsor exagerated p?
At the cut off point for the next alocation in the wind tunnel/CFD Mclaren was behind Alpine so we will have a double advantage,we are going to use more wind/tunnel time and we will no longer waste time on the road to Cologne.
After the Sakir quali the difference between RBR and Mclaren was 2.2s and now there was just under 0.3s,that is a MASSIVE diference that use to be recouped in the aspirated engines era not in the hybrid era with restrictions on testing,wind tunnel,CFD,finances,so this is a MEGA JOB by the team.

Peter Windsor isn't exactly reliable, almost a parody.
For context, here's a bizarre article he did on Lando and Oscar. The guy is just weird, says stuff that can't be verified randomly.

https://www.planetf1.com/news/oscar-pia ... -red-bull/

[Farnborough]

People have short memories about Hungary last year. If we assume our weakneses in this car are carried over from last year. Lando Qualified 4th last year.. So maybe we wont be so bad.

LN has always been fast around that track too, remember his testing prior to race seat there apparently the quickest in their car at that time.

[taperoo2k]

People have short memories about Hungary last year. If we assume our weakneses in this car are carried over from last year. Lando Qualified 4th last year.. So maybe we wont be so bad.

McLaren probably have a lot more to do in order to understand the upgrades fully
and find the optimal setup for the car. I think they should do alright in Hungary, maybe not
on the podium but they should at least extend their lead over Alpine in the constructors.

Anyway it bodes well for 2024 and 2025 for McLaren. They seem to have turned a corner and
got on the right design track finally.

[Hammerfist]

This will be a long one
I heard last night on Peter Windsor's podcast that the call to put Lando&Oscar on hards was Zak's,nowidk if he was kidding or not but he(Zak) wax a racer and maybe he was thinking:'What would I do in this case'?
Do you think that Zak could have made the decision all by himself or Windsor exagerated p?
At the cut off point for the next alocation in the wind tunnel/CFD Mclaren was behind Alpine so we will have a double advantage,we are going to use more wind/tunnel time and we will no longer waste time on the road to Cologne.
After the Sakir quali the difference between RBR and Mclaren was 2.2s and now there was just under 0.3s,that is a MASSIVE diference that use to be recouped in the aspirated engines era not in the hybrid era with restrictions on testing,wind tunnel,CFD,finances,so this is a MEGA JOB by the team.

Peter Windsor isn't exactly reliable, almost a parody.
For context, here's a bizarre article he did on Lando and Oscar. The guy is just weird, says stuff that can't be verified randomly.

https://www.planetf1.com/news/oscar-pia ... -red-bull/

Lol yeah he is good for a good laugh Peter with his takes. But sometimes he has good factual info.
But the idea that Piastri isnt good for Lando is nuts.

[billamend]

I heard last night on Peter Windsor's podcast that the call to put Lando&Oscar on hards was Zak's

That was a joke from Lando. It was obviously not Zak's decision.

[Mostlyeels]

Peter Windsor isn't exactly reliable, almost a parody.

Have to concur. I enjoyed his shows with Scarbs, but OTOH his analysis on Bottas's driving style always seemed way off reality. I haven't read anything from him lately.