2023 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[mwillems]

Isn't that the 2022 wing?

Nah I remember all the talk of them bringing the wing to Monza.

Yes apologies, Remembered and edited

You think it will be a low DF track? I haven't a clue, haven't looked, but it took me by surprise. Now I look I would think the Silverstone wing.

[organic]

Nah I remember all the talk of them bringing the wing to Monza.

Yes apologies, Remembered and edited

You think it will be a low DF track? I haven't a clue, haven't looked, but it took me by surprise. Now I look I would think the Silverstone wing.

The straight is about 2km long so yes I think so

[mwillems]

Yes apologies, Remembered and edited

You think it will be a low DF track? I haven't a clue, haven't looked, but it took me by surprise. Now I look I would think the Silverstone wing.

The straight is about 2km long so yes I think so

True. 6 slow corners though. Baku Config or still pure low df?

Edit: Maybe more than 6, hard to tell. 6 minimum.

Edit 2: From F1 website:
“A spectacular 14-turn high-speed design that will have a high average speed and require teams to bring their low downforce Monza/Spa-spec aerodynamic packages. It’s going to be fast and furious,"

So yeah, low DF.

[FittingMechanics]

Norris did a bad lap and ended P1 for sprint.

Is it impossible that VER had only 0.15s of a gap per lap (without massive risk) over a race distance?

Verstappen was told what was the fastest lap - purple lap 12.4 so he knew. Once Norris pitted and started closing the gap Verstappen responded but never dominantly to show he had pace in hand. He started matching Lando or being slightly slower but he had decent gap to the end. With the tire delta that is understandable. Him having to fight for it would also explain why there was no attempt for fastest lap. Not that they are unable to match but that VER did not sacrifice his tires to achieve it. NOR knew he has no chance to catch after last pitstop so he used them immediately.

This kind of behaviour is completely different to most other races where he would cruise to a big gap and then cruise until he wanted fastest lap. I just don't buy that Verstappen suddenly changed his behaviour and that he always had massive amount of pace in hand. As his engineer told on the radio, he had pace to catch but he still needed to conserve tires to have enough to overtake.

In the interview Verstappen also said he felt the times are similar earlier in the stint but that they could open up a bit of a gap at the end of the stints. Which is what we saw.

Also similar gap was observed yesterday. Everything points there was jo magic hidden pace in Red Bull.

[mwillems]

Yeah I agree it is different and asks a lot of questions, not sure there is enough to make a conclusion but totally get your perspective and couldn't argue with you too much.

[organic]

You think it will be a low DF track? I haven't a clue, haven't looked, but it took me by surprise. Now I look I would think the Silverstone wing.

The straight is about 2km long so yes I think so

True. 6 slow corners though. Baku Config or still pure low df?

It's a complicated equation.

It's going to be very cold meaning air will be denser. Air temp change by 3C is around ~1% density change and Vegas could be close to 0C I think? This will make efficiency more important.

Track temps cold means getting heat into the carcass of the tyre will be important, and a lower DF setup might not be able to energize the tyre properly and end up sliding with high surface temps and lower carcass temps.. So that would suggest running more DF

in 2020 the Eifel GP was similar in the sense that it was extremely cold and teams focused on setups that increased tyre temp more than anything. And it lowered field spread a lot IIRC.

Teams will be making a pivotal choice on wing level. Enough wing to have good 1-lap pace and you might have an unraceable car - McLaren at Spa.. and too little wing and you won't get any tyre temp for one lap and will grain the tyres in the race. Cars that have good natural tyre warmup can compromise less on this and pick more based on efficiency, whilst some of the more typically efficient cars may struggle more in this aspect - Ferrari for example have been weak on tyre warmup since their Barcelona upgrade and could be forced to run a larger RW for quali pace.

First and foremost it's about tyre warmup, then picking the efficient RW. If it's Monza DF levels despite this, then advantage Ferrari/McL as RB doesn't have a dedicated Monza RW. But if it's Spa/Baku levels then RB has the perfect RW for it

There's also the factor of cooling: at Vegas teams will be able to close up a lot of their cooling. Some teams will benefit more than others from doing so.. I don't claim to know who would take more advantage from this compared to others.

[mwillems]

The straight is about 2km long so yes I think so

True. 6 slow corners though. Baku Config or still pure low df?

It's a complicated equation.

It's going to be very cold meaning air will be denser. Air temp change by 3C is around ~1% density change and Vegas could be close to 0C I think? This will make efficiency more important.

Track temps cold means getting heat into the carcass of the tyre will be important, and a lower DF setup might not be able to energize the tyre properly and end up sliding with high surface temps and lower carcass temps.. So that would suggest running more DF

in 2020 the Eifel GP was similar in the sense that it was extremely cold and teams focused on setups that increased tyre temp more than anything. And it lowered field spread a lot IIRC.

Teams will be making a pivotal choice on wing level. Enough wing to have good 1-lap pace and you might have an unraceable car - McLaren at Spa.. and too little wing and you won't get any tyre temp for one lap and will grain the tyres in the race. Cars that have good natural tyre warmup can compromise less on this and pick more based on efficiency, whilst some of the more typically efficient cars may struggle more in this aspect - Ferrari for example have been weak on tyre warmup since their Barcelona upgrade and could be forced to run a larger RW for quali pace.

First and foremost it's about tyre warmup, then picking the efficient RW. If it's Monza DF levels despite this, then advantage Ferrari/McL as RB doesn't have a dedicated Monza RW. But if it's Spa/Baku levels then RB has the perfect RW for it

There's also the factor of cooling: at Vegas teams will be able to close up a lot of their cooling. Some teams will benefit more than others from doing so.. I don't claim to know who would take more advantage from this compared to others.

Do you mean 9c? 0c would be treacherous

Very good knowledge and memory there.

[FittingMechanics]

Yeah I agree it is different and asks a lot of questions, not sure there is enough to make a conclusion but totally get your perspective and couldn't argue with you too much.

I think when you realize that Norris did to the rest of the field what Verstappen used to do (gap them easily) you realize the pace was real. Without VER Norris would be a pitstop clear on P2.

Otherwise if Verstappen had hidden pace then he could have left Alonso/Perez/Sainz/Hamilton 50 seconds behind.

Also remember Norris starting 17th and finishing 5th (or 15 to 5 in half race).

The pace is real. Ver is still faster but not much.

[Macklaren]

Agree with all the comments above. Very uncharacteristic behavior by Max. Either he's flattering Lando because Lando is his friend and let him "take" the fastest lap. Or they couldn't go for it for whatever reason (tires, risk etc)

[Ground Effect]

At this point, I'd gladly take a Lando GP win via a Verstappen DSQ. How many P2 finishes is that this season? Lando is doing the absolute Max, ( no pun intended) but that RB19 is just too strong. I'm really proud of what the team has achieved with the turnaround, full credit to them. A season finale with a win in Abu Dhabi would be sweet.

[BMMR61]

So Max had saved a new soft for the final stint, Lando a scrubbed. We have seen evidence that a scrubbed tyre has a property of "sealing in" greater durability and the new has to be treated very carefully for a few laps. This seems to gel with what we saw and GP's radio comms with Max where they were not wanting to prematurely kill of the tyres.

Another observation, McLaren now regularly hit the ground running from FP1 - the car just has a good way with setup and that setup is we'll understood after fine-tuning through Silverstone, Turkey, but more especially after Singapore. Wherever they go they have something close to the second fastest. With the sprint format, this knowledge and generally benign condition - Mexico temperatures excluded - McLaren have the second fastest car and Brazil was the most impressive showing other than Silverstone. Terrific drive Lando, not as enthralling as his drive at Mexico, but it points to the gap being reduced to RB, increased to Mercedes and Ferrari. Better than that, the team haven't lost understanding of "the package" although Oscar has had a bit of a mixed bag of late, not all of it his own doing.

[Ground Effect]

So Max had saved a new soft for the final stint, Lando a scrubbed. We have seen evidence that a scrubbed tyre has a property of "sealing in" greater durability and the new has to be treated very carefully for a few laps. This seems to gel with what we saw and GP's radio comms with Max where they were not wanting to prematurely kill of the tyres.

Another observation, McLaren now regularly hit the ground running from FP1 - the car just has a good way with setup and that setup is we'll understood after fine-tuning through Silverstone, Turkey, but more especially after Singapore. Wherever they go they have something close to the second fastest. With the sprint format, this knowledge and generally benign condition - Mexico temperatures excluded - McLaren have the second fastest car and Brazil was the most impressive showing other than Silverstone. Terrific drive Lando, not as enthralling as his drive at Mexico, but it points to the gap being reduced to RB, increased to Mercedes and Ferrari. Better than that, the team haven't lost understanding of "the package" although Oscar has had a bit of a mixed bag of late, not all of it his own doing.

I'm assuming you meant Hungary? Spot on with the rest though....

[Espresso]

At this point, I'd gladly take a Lando GP win via a Verstappen DSQ. How many P2 finishes is that this season? Lando is doing the absolute Max, ( no pun intended) but that RB19 is just too strong. I'm really proud of what the team has achieved with the turnaround, full credit to them. A season finale with a win in Abu Dhabi would be sweet.

MCL is on the right way. The fastes car has to be designed toward the ´limit of instability´ when cornering. Great drivers are able to adapt to this. The RB has a quirk. The MCL has a quirk. Difference is MCL has 2 drivers at the moment able to adapt to the quirk. But I agree a finale with a MCL 1-2 would be a great icing on the cake!

[Marc.W]

Damage to floor and rear brake duct for Oscar

[mwillems]

At this point, I'd gladly take a Lando GP win via a Verstappen DSQ. How many P2 finishes is that this season? Lando is doing the absolute Max, ( no pun intended) but that RB19 is just too strong. I'm really proud of what the team has achieved with the turnaround, full credit to them. A season finale with a win in Abu Dhabi would be sweet.

Just a DSQ and no DNFs? That's a bit mean