2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[Emag]

Lando 2023 Bahrain, Midrace stint, Average -> 38.2

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Oscar 2024 Pre-Season, Midrace stint "simulation", Average -> 37.8

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So the 2024 car is just 0.4s per lap faster than the initial spec MCL60?

The car which is supposed to be at least 0.5s faster per lap over the Abu Dhabi spec 2023 car (based on team's comments about gains they needed to find), which in turn was estimated to be anywhere near from 0.8 to 1s faster than the Bahrain spec MCL60?

Oscar wasn't pushing at all ...

EDIT : The laptimes were pulled pulled from the same amount of laps after the beginning of the race for Lando and the beginning of the race sim for Oscar

[Cs98]

https://i.ibb.co/DppDyWr/image.png

Lando 2023 Bahrain, Midrace stint, Average -> 38.2

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https://i.ibb.co/Sy7y11J/image.png

Oscar 2024 Pre-Season, Midrace stint "simulation", Average -> 37.8

So the 2024 car is just 0.4s per lap faster than the initial spec MCL60?

The car which is supposed to be at least 0.5s faster per lap over the Abu Dhabi spec 2023 car (based on team's comments about gains they needed to find), which in turn was estimated to be anywhere near from 0.8 to 1s faster than the Bahrain spec MCL60?

Oscar wasn't pushing at all ...

EDIT : The laptimes were pulled pulled from the same amount of laps after the beginning of the race for Lando and the beginning of the race sim for Oscar

Lando did 6 stints in Bahrain. Obviously if you slap on a new set of tyres every 9 laps you are going to have some decent lap times. Even so, his first stint was in the 1:40s, second in the 39s, third in the 38s, fourth in the 37s etc. Oscar starts out immediately in the 38s, then does a 20 lap stint in the mid to low 37s, then drops to a high 35 on the final stint. He's miles quicker than Lando despite using less tyres and doing 3 less pit stops. So no, the point you are trying to make is not valid.

[mwillems]

Lando's times didn't get to mid 1:37s and stay there until lap 29 of last years race.

Oscar did only 15 laps before his C1 stint, which was 3 times longer than Landos stint in the race. Lando carried a hydraulic issue that meant he had to come back into the pits regularly, so every lap on those tyres was a push lap. Oscar was taking it easy.


I really don't think there is a comparison.

[Emag]

https://i.ibb.co/DppDyWr/image.png

Lando 2023 Bahrain, Midrace stint, Average -> 38.2

=========================================================================================

https://i.ibb.co/Sy7y11J/image.png

Oscar 2024 Pre-Season, Midrace stint "simulation", Average -> 37.8

So the 2024 car is just 0.4s per lap faster than the initial spec MCL60?

The car which is supposed to be at least 0.5s faster per lap over the Abu Dhabi spec 2023 car (based on team's comments about gains they needed to find), which in turn was estimated to be anywhere near from 0.8 to 1s faster than the Bahrain spec MCL60?

Oscar wasn't pushing at all ...

EDIT : The laptimes were pulled pulled from the same amount of laps after the beginning of the race for Lando and the beginning of the race sim for Oscar

Lando did 6 stints in Bahrain. Obviously if you slap on a new set of tyres every 9 laps you are going to have some decent lap times. Even so, his first stint was in the 1:40s, second in the 39s, third in the 38s, fourth in the 37s etc. Oscar starts out immediately in the 38s, then does a 20 lap stint in the mid to low 37s, then drops to a high 35 on the final stint. He's miles quicker than Lando despite using less tyres and doing 3 less pit stops. So no, the point you are trying to make is not valid.

Those were 2nd and 3rd stints. He was doing low 38s and high 37s respectifully. You're averaging it wrong.

The 2023 car is "enjoying" the benefit of having fresher tires, but they had an hydraulic problem. They couldn't really push so this is not as fast as they could go.

The race simulation Oscar run in the last day is not representative of the pace of the car, because if it is, McLaren is slower than Sauber

If that turns out to be the case in Bahrain, then by all means, I'll accept that I am wrong.

Either way, I just dont think the gap to Ferrari is 0.7s
It's way too big for a team which has publicly stated the aim is victories and the higher constructor positions for this year.

With that sort of gap they can kiss goodbye to both of those goals.

[mwillems]

You can see the second stint is in the 1:39s and the third in the 1:38s.

Fresher tyres, less fuel and no worry about the tyre deg.

It's not a comparison.

[Cs98]

https://i.ibb.co/DppDyWr/image.png

Lando 2023 Bahrain, Midrace stint, Average -> 38.2

=========================================================================================

https://i.ibb.co/Sy7y11J/image.png

Oscar 2024 Pre-Season, Midrace stint "simulation", Average -> 37.8

So the 2024 car is just 0.4s per lap faster than the initial spec MCL60?

The car which is supposed to be at least 0.5s faster per lap over the Abu Dhabi spec 2023 car (based on team's comments about gains they needed to find), which in turn was estimated to be anywhere near from 0.8 to 1s faster than the Bahrain spec MCL60?

Oscar wasn't pushing at all ...

EDIT : The laptimes were pulled pulled from the same amount of laps after the beginning of the race for Lando and the beginning of the race sim for Oscar

Lando did 6 stints in Bahrain. Obviously if you slap on a new set of tyres every 9 laps you are going to have some decent lap times. Even so, his first stint was in the 1:40s, second in the 39s, third in the 38s, fourth in the 37s etc. Oscar starts out immediately in the 38s, then does a 20 lap stint in the mid to low 37s, then drops to a high 35 on the final stint. He's miles quicker than Lando despite using less tyres and doing 3 less pit stops. So no, the point you are trying to make is not valid.

Those were 2nd and 3rd stints. He was doing low 38s and high 37s respectifully. You're averaging it wrong.

The 2023 car is "enjoying" the benefit of having fresher tires, but they had an hydraulic problem. They couldn't really push so this is not as fast as they could go.

The race simulation Oscar run in the last day is not representative of the pace of the car, because if it is, McLaren is slower than Sauber

If that turns out to be the case in Bahrain, then by all means, I'll accept that I am wrong.

Either way, I just dont think the gap to Ferrari is 0.7s
It's way too big for a team which has publicly stated the aim is victories and the higher constructor positions for this year.

With that sort of gap they can kiss goodbye to both of those goals.

I'm averaging perfectly fine. His 2nd and 3rd stint he was averaging a low 39 and a mid 38 respectively. I've no idea how you are arriving at these strange numbers. It helps pressing the "hide outliers" button to get a better picture.

[CjC]

Have you seen this??

https://x.com/startonpole/status/176130 ... 90137?s=20

Took this from Wiktor977 in the Aston thread.

Look at where they had Mclaren in the pecking order last season for race pace.
Just goes to show how useless all these predictions are

[mwillems]

Piastri was well within his limits, dropping a few tenths per lap coasting in turns 12-13. by losing 16kph through that section.

Throttle and RPM, aside from 12 and 13, are by and large the same across the laps but the lines that I circled show progressively less coasting in 12 and 13 in order to maintain lap times to the required delta, the white and pinkish lines at the top are his final laps before pitting. The fact that he doesn't need to do much to maintain the pace suggests either tyre management is fantastic or this car is well within it's limits.

Also, looking at the comparison for the 23 race. Lando smashed Ferraris fastest lap by 2 seconds in the race, precisely because his hydraulic issue wasn't slowing him down and he was also in clean air, so you can't compare life this.

[MCLvamos]

The worst case scenario without it being genuinely concerning is 0.5s+ delta to Red Bull, and 0.2-0.3s max delta to Ferrari. Whilst it would still signal a disappointing winter where a team changing concept has leapfrogged us, it is a decent position to develop from and we can fight for P2 in the constructors from there, which should be the goal this year. If it's any more than that of a gap to Ferrari in Bahrain, it will be a slam dunk at most circuits in terms of the pecking order and we will struggle to out develop them in any meaningful way. I doubt any steps we take with upgrades will give us the same *relative* jump as Austria last year given we should already be pretty close to the front as a baseline. Not sure about you guys, but I'm really nervous for next week.

[SmallSoldier]

The issue is that the comp here is Leclerc who also did a middle stint on C1, and was on average one second faster than this stint from Piastri. Looking at engine modes and top speeds they look comparable. This is why I fear for McLaren.

The problem is that the data is really difficult to read because the stints were quite different in the number of laps as well as the approach.

Oscar first stint had 14 laps on C3, Leclerc had 18 laps on C3
Oscar second stint had 21 laps on C1, Leclerc had 17 laps on C1
And for the final stint, Oscar had 11 laps on C3, Leclerc had 6 laps on C3

So we have 46 laps for Oscar and 41 laps for Leclerc

Now, if we do take the averages of those middle stints, the average of Oscar is indeed around 1s off Leclerc, but the thing is, Oscar's stint was not natural in how it was progressing, because while Leclerc was getting slower towards the end as you expect it to, Oscar was actually getting faster, which implies they were not running a true race simulation.

And something that is very noticeable in Oscar's stints, is that he actually starts out relatively slow before going faster and stabilizing in a certain x laptime.

It just seems to me that they were doing a pre-planned programme in tyre management in order to help Oscar get a better feel on the tire under different circumstances.

Add to this the fact that Leclerc's first stint was actually longer, which means he had less fuel on the car when he got to the C1s, plus the unknown initial fuel loads (Leclerc ended the full simulation with less laps), I don't think those middle stints are comparable 1:1 at all.

The last C3 stint though, perhaps paints a better picture. And if you discount the laps where it seems the deg was significant, the gap was closer to 0.5s.

Considering that Oscar had this tendency of not pushing during practice sessions (pretty often we have seen race simulations run on FP2 when he seemed pretty far off, and that didn't turn out to be the case come race day). and also the fact that you would probably expect Lando to still have the upper hand on him when it comes to race pace, especially on such a high-deg track, that doesn't seem too unreasonable to be honest.

McLaren said themselves they are behind Ferrari and RedBull. I think the gap, in Lando's hands under real racing conditions, is probably closer to 0.2-0.3s

The gap in the first and third stints is something like 7-8 tenths, so let's not kid ourselves it's only the middle stint that shows a big gap. If you are expecting to be within 2-3 tenths of Ferrari (not to mention Red Bull) I think you are in for a rude awakening come Saturday. I think the real gap will be at least half a second here in the race, maybe more (to Ferrari).

And now we argue gap differences in the “tenths” based on “testing data”… Wow.

[mendis]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/norr ... /10579450/

Lando Norris believes his McLaren team is still "a very long way behind Red Bull and a long way behind Ferrari" after Formula 1's Bahrain winter test.

[djos]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/norr ... /10579450/

Lando Norris believes his McLaren team is still "a very long way behind Red Bull and a long way behind Ferrari" after Formula 1's Bahrain winter test.

To be fair, Lando seems to be a glass half empty kinda guy most of the time. I think he likes being surprised when things go well.

[mwillems]

The worst case scenario without it being genuinely concerning is 0.5s+ delta to Red Bull, and 0.2-0.3s max delta to Ferrari. Whilst it would still signal a disappointing winter where a team changing concept has leapfrogged us, it is a decent position to develop from and we can fight for P2 in the constructors from there, which should be the goal this year. If it's any more than that of a gap to Ferrari in Bahrain, it will be a slam dunk at most circuits in terms of the pecking order and we will struggle to out develop them in any meaningful way. I doubt any steps we take with upgrades will give us the same *relative* jump as Austria last year given we should already be pretty close to the front as a baseline. Not sure about you guys, but I'm really nervous for next week.

We've definately taken a jump. But trying to find comparative meaning between this year and last year is not possible for us, But the point i was making is the Mcl60 numbers aren't like the Mcl38 either, that is totally untrue to suggest any similarity in performance between this and last year, either in race or testing.

[FittingMechanics]

When we talk about Piastri and his race sim compared to Leclerc we have to remember that this was a first race sim McLaren did on MCL38. The day before Lando was unable to do a race sim due to a clutch issue. Ferrari on the other hand did a race sim day before and had plenty of long run data. This alone could mean that Ferrari knew where the limits are better than McLaren. Oscar being able to keep stable laptimes throughout the stint points toward them not fully using tyres.

Another factor is that Piastri still isn't a tyre whisperer. Third factor is that Ferrari always tests better than they race (probably they use higher engine mode by default compared to Mercedes teams). Fourth is that Bahrain is not great for McLaren. If you take all those factors into account, things are not that bad. I won't be surprised if Ferrari is still ahead, but I don't think it will be a significant margin. It could very well be completely different in a couple of races times.

On the other hand, I just watched Drive to Survive episode 3 - where they show how McLaren did in some of the early races. It seems I have blocked out that part of my memory, seeing them finish 17th and 19th. When we feel bad if Ferrari seems quicker, just remember start of last year. Also what a great second part of the season McLaren had and we should trust the team and their development. If they say they are still seeing same gradient of development we should be quite happy. Maybe we get another season where McLaren keeps improving throughout the year.

[Tomsky]