2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

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There should have been 4 and 5. Strategists are very dumb.

I think leaving Noris out was fine.

With the lack straight line speed we couldn't overtake today so not much point in following cars losing time. At least they gave the chance of Noris gaining positions with a late safety car, fate wasn't to be today.

The distance between Oscar and Lando was 7 seconds, which was enough for a double pit stop

Agreed that was the best call in hindsight

[Darth-Piekus]

Comparing the fastest Mclaren and the fastest Red Bull what is the difference between the cars and where are we losing time compared to Red Bull?

[Dafnalina]

[LionsHeart]

Impressive progress

[Ben1980]

Those tyres are awful. 42 laps with no noticeable degradation.

Watching the car in the middle sector was impressive.

[mwillems]

Those race pace graphs by Holiness will flatter Merc and retard Mclaren due to Hamiltons great job of holding up Piastri.

[Stig14]

I think leaving Noris out was fine.

With the lack straight line speed we couldn't overtake today so not much point in following cars losing time. At least they gave the chance of Noris gaining positions with a late safety car, fate wasn't to be today.

The distance between Oscar and Lando was 7 seconds, which was enough for a double pit stop

Agreed that was the best call in hindsight

This is the thing though and I agree - with hindsight this was the best call but at the time this wasn't clear. The gaggle behind Magnussen could have easily tangled, brought out a safety car and then allowed Lando to at least have a go at cars ahead of Piastri on fresh tyres towards the end. We would have all said that leaving him out was a great choice then but it didn't work out.

I think Emag's assessment on the previous page of the race was very well balanced and provided a good summary for the team.

On to the next rounds which should hopefully suit the car even more with the development race heating up

[CjC]

Just a heads up, sounds like Lando was in on the not pitting under an early safety car scenario- perhaps it was a pre-planned before the race?

Also sounds like McLaren picked the wrong drag level for Jeddah. I have to say that’s seems to be a reoccurring nightmare but then again it seems McLaren are comfortable with their package in low downforce configuration.
There’s suggestion that McLaren will HAVE TO run with lower downforce in Melbourne

[CjC]

Good race overall I would say. If you pit Lando with a double stack you run the risk of waiting for other cars passing through and ending up last ...
It was definitely the safer decision to not double stack in that situation, so I don't think much can be pinned on the team for that.

The straight line deficit is hurting them a lot, and together with the low speed weakness, these are areas that must be addressed as quickly as possible. They were losing 0.2-0.3s on the non-drs straights just out of chassis drag alone. And then with DRS, they were barely getting any advantage over the non-drs cars. Just very very poor in general. Which is a shame because pace otherwise was great.

Good to confirm what we saw on Bahrain. RedBull is in another league, Ferrari a bit ahead, and McLaren -= Mercedes
I believe Aston was flattered here because of the very low-deg nature of the track. There was literally 0 degradation with hards possibly having enough on them to do the full race distance. Leclerc even set the fastest lap in the end there, beating the one Lewis set on fresh softs.

I am inclined to think the base platform is quite solid this year, but the weaknesses are making them lose a lot of laptime. We obviously have no idea how much potential the rivals will unlock over time, but regardless, it is crucial that McLaren delivers relatively large steps with their packages if they want to get into the fight for podiums, at first, and then another rather large step is needed to get into the fight for victories.

Podiums seem feasible at the moment, but judging by the situation as it is right now, victories are looking very hard to achieve, for any team to be honest, not just McLaren.

Another good summary- backing up your other solid post from after quali.

The straight line is starting to massively hamper them. I’ll always remember Jenson Button once ‘straight line speed advantage is just free laptime’. I know it’s quite a black and white statement and it’s not totally true but he has a point.
Like I said just before I feel Mclaren aren’t totally comfortable with this package in low DF trim

[Ben1980]

[mwillems]

Yea I think the soft tyres was the wrong choice in hindsight. Hulkenberg on his hards is lapping within a tenth or 2 of Lando

Yeah, the softs are tired now. Perhaps Norris should have pitted earlier.

Could have gone Hards earlier. But chance of another safety car I guess.

It all depends where you're going to come out. Pitting Lando to hards means you'd need to pit sufficiently early for the hards to get up to speed, and then since they aren't as fast, also extra time to get to the back of Bearman and have a go. This was always going to be tricky to make work. As others have said, there was certainly time to double stack and this would have been the best decision, it wasn't even close, but you don't know until you tried it and the team made a sensible decision to split the strategy, spread the bets as see what pays out. They got a good points haul on Piatsri so it wasn't a bad call.

Good racing by both drivers today, nice to see Piatsri's progress in the race. He fought pretty hard and the tyres didn't get away from him, but the hards did help here. This will be a good experience against Hamilton as he builds his racecraft and learns from the best.

I'm happy with what the team have done so far, but let's just say I can't wait for the upgrades to come

[CjC]

I totally forgot that he said that yesterday.
He’s a man of his word

[FittingMechanics]

About the jump start, I am not sure how F1 TV announcers didn't remember that Vettel had the same type of jump start where he moved and stopped, and havent triggered the system.

About the race, Piastri probably had a chance for P3 if he got ahead of Leclerc in the pits, I am surprised we didn't overtake him as Ferrari had a 5 second pitstop, maybe they need to look at the gaps before?

About Lando, I thought they may have kept him out so he can serve his penalty during pitstop. In the end it was unfortunate but any kind of safety car could have brought things into play for him.

In any case, good solid start of the season. Good race by both guys.

[Dafnalina]

About the jump start, I am not sure how F1 TV announcers didn't remember that Vettel had the same type of jump start where he moved and stopped, and havent triggered the system.

About the race, Piastri probably had a chance for P3 if he got ahead of Leclerc in the pits, I am surprised we didn't overtake him as Ferrari had a 5 second pitstop, maybe they need to look at the gaps before?

About Lando, I thought they may have kept him out so he can serve his penalty during pitstop. In the end it was unfortunate but any kind of safety car could have brought things into play for him.

In any case, good solid start of the season. Good race by both guys.

Lewis did the same in Brazil 5 races ago iirc precedent saved him, but he didn't really gain antyhing by it anyways.

[Darth-Piekus]

It looks like the distance from last year. We were 8 tenths in Bahrain but with a worse car, 6 tenths here from Red Bull and if things go as intended it should be 4 tenths from Red Bull in Australia and on par with Ferrari.