2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[mwillems]

I suspect it's a strategy agreed with the drivers as they all sense a run at a title.

It now makes sense to forgo the cost savings of bulk.updates.

Still, even with caveats I wouldn't be saying out loud that he thinks we know better how to find time than Red Bull,, it seems like tempting fate.

[Tomsky]

[Tomsky]

[Emag]

So ultimately, we ideally should make the car a little bit faster, and then be in condition to chase the victory independent of the conditions on track or the track characteristics because we have to say that when we were in dry conditions, Mercedes was faster than us.

Pretty much what I was saying. If your car is good enough, you don't need to rely on external factors. You just overtake on track. McLaren wasn't fast enough to win on pure pace until the next round of upgrades, which is coming faster than expected.

[Ben1980]

Red Bull were due big upgrades in Suzuka, then Imola now it's Barcelona. Ferrari were expecting a big one in Imola.

The size of the Mclaren upgrade boost to performance is seemingly muddying what people expect from an upgrade.

All teams will likely be bits here and there, apart from those at the back, still catching up, like Alpine.

[CjC]

He’s absolutely rattled by the competition then

[CjC]

Red Bull were due big upgrades in Suzuka, then Imola now it's Barcelona. Ferrari were expecting a big one in Imola.

The size of the Mclaren upgrade boost to performance is seemingly muddying what people expect from an upgrade.

All teams will likely be bits here and there, apart from those at the back, still catching up, like Alpine.

Exactly, I’m expecting it to be status quo when we go to Barcelona. If Merc ARE ahead then they’ll still be ahead in the pecking order

[Cs98]

If true the FIA should introduce a mid-season technical directive fixing it, just like they did against RB in 2021 and against AMR in 2023. McLaren should not receive special treatment when no one else did.

[BMMR61]

How much longer can Mercedes keep bringing upgrades to every GP? Granted most of them haven't worked but just on cost cap grounds, they must be pushing the envelope, and so early. McLaren to my knowledge didn't bring any upgrades of significance until the major one at Miami. Since then, round 6, nothing of significance and now the announcement that there will just be little things for the rest of the season. I'm sure that work has started on the MCL39 about now and the 4 races on very different circuits with the B spec will be providing good data for the next McLaren which is supposed to be a championship challenger. Did anyone believe that we would be here a month ago?

[BMMR61]

Red Bull were due big upgrades in Suzuka, then Imola now it's Barcelona. Ferrari were expecting a big one in Imola.

The size of the Mclaren upgrade boost to performance is seemingly muddying what people expect from an upgrade.

All teams will likely be bits here and there, apart from those at the back, still catching up, like Alpine.

Exactly, I’m expecting it to be status quo when we go to Barcelona. If Merc ARE ahead then they’ll still be ahead in the pecking order

We were pretty cautious after the win on debut of the B spec - I think the same level of caution should be applied to how competitive Mercedes may be on different tracks from here. It's fair to say they have made a significant step in performance, how big we need to reserve judgement on until Barcelona.

For McLaren, Barcelona will be a chance to recalibrate the relative attributes on different circuit types, corners etc. Canada as a circuit on it's own is a bit of an outlier even without the rain. Monaco is an outlier and we didn't see a genuine marker of race pace owing to Leclerc's extreme mobile chicane efforts. Until recently we were making predictions of competitiveness based on historic results - we didn't favour long slow corners but excelled on medium to high speed corners - but is this now going to take a significant shift as far as high speed cornering performance goes?

[CjC]

If true the FIA should introduce a mid-season technical directive fixing it, just like they did against RB in 2021 and against AMR in 2023. McLaren should not receive special treatment when no one else did.

True but Horner himself says the accused teams wings are passing the flex test?

[Cs98]

If true the FIA should introduce a mid-season technical directive fixing it, just like they did against RB in 2021 and against AMR in 2023. McLaren should not receive special treatment when no one else did.

True but Horner himself says the accused teams wings are passing the flex test?

RB passed the flex tests in 2021, AMR passed them in 2023. The FIA changed the tests mid season to catch those teams out and render their wings illegal after teams had complained they were flexing excessively.

[FittingMechanics]

It is interesting to see how much noise is being made just as McLaren gained performance. Last week about the fuel pump, now about flexi wing. I guess they are worried.

[mwillems]

How much longer can Mercedes keep bringing upgrades to every GP? Granted most of them haven't worked but just on cost cap grounds, they must be pushing the envelope, and so early. McLaren to my knowledge didn't bring any upgrades of significance until the major one at Miami. Since then, round 6, nothing of significance and now the announcement that there will just be little things for the rest of the season. I'm sure that work has started on the MCL39 about now and the 4 races on very different circuits with the B spec will be providing good data for the next McLaren which is supposed to be a championship challenger. Did anyone believe that we would be here a month ago?

He didn't say little things, just individual parts. A new floor can still bring a lot of time, as can changes to the front wing and the fences or the sidepods. The general package is probably where they want and now they can make changes without having to adapt the whole package to the flow structures as they should still work well together.

As I said before, this is just about sacrificing some build cost for outright pace on the track. We may be at the point were the gains are decreasing, but even if we are I don't think this decision is based on that, I think it is more to do with cost v performance. Performance this season has become much more important at each GP therefore the strategy has changed to weight the equation more towards performance at each race.

It won't be as exciting, maybe a tenth or under for each part, but over several races and with a few parts released we may still find big time.

If Miami was still upwards of 4 tenths then it was still on a par with last years upgrades. Who knows what will happen but if we can squeeze 3-4 tenths before summer break then I think we're getting towards having the outright fastest car, but probably not dominant yet. RB seemed to half an average of half a second at their peak,

[FittingMechanics]

Well said. When you are 0.5s off and the gaps between teams are large, having piecemeal updates doesn't really bring a lot. It only makes correlation harder and development more expensive. But now when you get 2-3 teams within a tenth, any update is worth having.