2023 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[sjy1969]

Am assuming Lando will need to take an engine grid penalty at some point. Seems like he's been on the current one for ages.

I think they should to be honest, either Cota, Mexico or Brazil, if they leave it to Brazil I wonder if they can try to replicate what’s Mercedes have done historically around Brazil by installing a new PUs with higher mappings and coming back.

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

[organic]

Am assuming Lando will need to take an engine grid penalty at some point. Seems like he's been on the current one for ages.

I think they should to be honest, either Cota, Mexico or Brazil, if they leave it to Brazil I wonder if they can try to replicate what’s Mercedes have done historically around Brazil by installing a new PUs with higher mappings and coming back.

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

The car should be fine at Mexico. Not ideal with the slow corners but the amount of downforce the car produces should mean Ferrari, Merc and AMR cannot challenge McLaren

[AR3-GP]

It was evident in Austria, how much downforce they have. With the c-spec, Mclaren and RB will be in another formula in Mexico.

[haza]

Yeah the McLaren and RBR are downforce monsters I don’t think anyone will touch them in Mexico

[Juzh]

It was 9s of real gap, not 10s. This is because of how VSC inherently works. If you look at gaps as soon as VSC ends you will notice Lando is actually 11.7s behind and just exiting spoon corner, but Max was in the middle of back straight at that time, therefore he was cruising for half the straight where ordinarily you are full throttle. As a result Lando gains back 2.7 seconds from spoon exit to final chicane. That's why when looking at VSC gaps you always have to look at the first available gap after a major braking event, as only then are gaps really reset to what they used to before VSC (in most cases).

We're really arguing semantics, but we are on f1technical after all.

In regards to total race deficit you can't really take it at face value. Verstappen was cruising for entire last stint, lifting trough 130r for no reason, coasting into braking zones, leaving meters of track on exits, etc... Even his fastest lap wasn't done on any special engine mode, he just pushed a little harder, but still not really going all out.

wow, I wasn't watching Verstappen's onboard, but that's.... something. Looks like for sure only chance of a McLaren win any time soon then is a RB DNF (although this was probably true anyway, you've just made clear how much he still had in the pocket). Need some racing gods help for that, but these podiums feel pretty goddamn good too!

Well tbh, he did start pushing a bit more in later stages, I didnt watch it in full yet when i wrote that comment, at least he wasn't just hanging around anymore. I think in a completely normal race from start to finish gap would be around 30s if RB so wanted.

[MCLvamos]

I did mention in Monza that they should've taken Norris' penalty there after Saturday. And even now in hindsight it would've been an even better call with some good tracks and upgrades after that race. With Lando's luck, the one race he takes the pen will somehow be the one Max DNFs or something

[Ground Effect]

I wish the team would keep the stealth mode livery for the rest of the season, much better than the regular one.... Zak Brown seems to have dropped a few kgs, at least I think.

[avantman]

I think they should to be honest, either Cota, Mexico or Brazil, if they leave it to Brazil I wonder if they can try to replicate what’s Mercedes have done historically around Brazil by installing a new PUs with higher mappings and coming back.

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

The car should be fine at Mexico. Not ideal with the slow corners but the amount of downforce the car produces should mean Ferrari, Merc and AMR cannot challenge McLaren

The last time teams raced with max downforce aero config Mclaren were third fastest car(would be fourth fastest if not for RB issues). It was in Singapore where teams run same aero configs as in Monaco and Mexico.
There is high speed, medium speed and low speed downforce. Mclaren have a lot of highspeed downforce, likely even more than the Red bull, but they are slower than both Ferrari and Mercedes through slow and medium-slow stuff. There are very few fast speed corners in Mexico, most are very slow.

[mwillems]

I think they should to be honest, either Cota, Mexico or Brazil, if they leave it to Brazil I wonder if they can try to replicate what’s Mercedes have done historically around Brazil by installing a new PUs with higher mappings and coming back.

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

The car should be fine at Mexico. Not ideal with the slow corners but the amount of downforce the car produces should mean Ferrari, Merc and AMR cannot challenge McLaren

It is its own unique challenge as it is 2.25km above sea level. This will affect Aero and aspiration with Aero being 25 pc down. This will level the Aero a little and mechanical properties will be pushed to the fore.

It will be a nice test.

[mwillems]

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

The car should be fine at Mexico. Not ideal with the slow corners but the amount of downforce the car produces should mean Ferrari, Merc and AMR cannot challenge McLaren

The last time teams raced with max downforce aero config Mclaren were third fastest car(would be fourth fastest if not for RB issues). It was in Singapore where teams run same aero configs as in Monaco and Mexico.
There is high speed, medium speed and low speed downforce. Mclaren have a lot of highspeed downforce, likely even more than the Red bull, but they are slower than both Ferrari and Mercedes through slow and medium-slow stuff. There are very few fast speed corners in Mexico, most are very slow.

Teams did not run the same wings in Monaco as Singapore. Monaco wings were like boat sails, Singapore wings were not.

The Singapore wing is the wing we chose not to run in Zandvoort in the wet, at Zandvoort we went with the old concept Max DF option instead. That wing was the high/very high wing as Stella describes it.

https://formu1a.uno/en/f1-news-why-mcla ... zandvoort/

In this next article Stella is explicit in that the new wing was not suitable for the wet conditions. Ignore GAs discussion, Stella's quote is pertinent.

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/gary ... ng-detail/

"The wing we had yesterday is suitable for this track in dry conditions, not necessarily in wet conditions. So we will see today what wing we are going to use for the remainder of the weekend. But the good news is that the part that we brought trackside correlates well with expectation. So we now have a wing that we can use for some other races coming like Singapore, Japan, Qatar, and so on."


The wing is quite adjustable and efficient and offers a range of settings but cannot offer Max DF, and as we know, whilst it didn't run in Suzuka, it was deemed as sufficiently close in performance to the medium spec wing to take a look but appears to be able to be operated from that Med DF setting to a High Medium/Low High setting.

[Tomsky]

Am assuming Lando will need to take an engine grid penalty at some point. Seems like he's been on the current one for ages.

I think they should to be honest, either Cota, Mexico or Brazil, if they leave it to Brazil I wonder if they can try to replicate what’s Mercedes have done historically around Brazil by installing a new PUs with higher mappings and coming back.

I'd be tempted to go with Mexico tbh if it can hang on that long. It's the one track left that I can see the car possibly struggling on.

The worst track for McLaren from the rest is Vegas.

[Tomsky]

[djos]

https://i.imgur.com/vrjBGBm.jpeg

Is it my imagination, or do they look like the kind of exhaust tips you's find on a million+ dollar supercar?

[Tomsky]

[mwillems]

https://i.imgur.com/vrjBGBm.jpeg

Is it my imagination, or do they look like the kind of exhaust tips you's find on a million+ dollar supercar?

Looks like something I'd get from my 3D printer!