2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[daren_p]

Does anyone remember the Dutch GP last year where after starting P2 on the grid, Norris/Mclaren stayed out a lap too long on slicks in the rain dropping them well down the order? Russia 2021. Mclaren keeps saying they are learning, but they aren't showing that they are learning. This weekend is not the first time that they faced these challenges.

If memory serves me correctly, at that point they should have just stuck it out & not stopped for intermediate tires, believe some others did the same & were far better off.

I too feel like Mclaren has bad decision making when it comes to weather & they don't appear to be progressing much in that area either. I know its been said lots already but sitting watching the race, I couldn't understand why they didn't double stack. And then when it came to dry tire choice, I saw Lewis put on the used softs, & was extremely happy we had a set of new mediums & thought it should be a win. As soon as I saw the used softs going on, my heart sank, there goes the win (with a bunch of shouting expletives thrown in)

I've seen a number of posters saying tire choice was Lando's but any messages I've heard posted, have the team with the final say? (Lando saying soft, or medium, whatever, followed up with Will saying we're going soft). I also thought the way tire choice was delivered to Lando, softs to cover Hamilton, medium for Verstappen was very misleading & should have never been worded that way. I agree with others, Mclaren needs to worry less about what others are doing & just do whatever is quickest for them.

[Ben1980]

The tyre choice was not Landos call. That's pretty clear.

While, the mediums would have been better, I'm sure the team thought the softs, on low fuel only 12 laps would be the best option. Maybe they thought the car would look after them. Or would be out in front of Lewis and manage them.

Many reasons why they made tge call, all with much more information than we have.

Still the wrong decision though.

[Darth-Piekus]

So out of curiosity. Do we expect another big upgrade package? Mercedes is upgrading like crazy and we havent had a good upgrade since Miami.

[_DM_]

The tyre choice was not Landos call. That's pretty clear.

While, the mediums would have been better, I'm sure the team thought the softs, on low fuel only 12 laps would be the best option. Maybe they thought the car would look after them. Or would be out in front of Lewis and manage them.

Many reasons why they made tge call, all with much more information than we have.

Still the wrong decision though.

I think the car was tuned for more downforce than Mercedes and the rest. That's why they were so fast in the rain. But this also caused overheating and high wear on Lando’s soft tires when he aggressively tried to catch up with Lewis

[michl420]

I would like to contribute a few more things to the strategy discussion. The decisions are of course wrong in retrospect, but in many wet/dry tire discusions the conclusion where let the driver make the choice. This circuit is very extrem. I don`t know if I remember corectly, but I saw a .31 lap right after a .39 lap. And I am still sceptically if the bigger wing from SA on was right.

[Ben1980]

So out of curiosity. Do we expect another big upgrade package? Mercedes is upgrading like crazy and we havent had a good upgrade since Miami.

All teams have been upgrading, Mckaren have brought stuff ladt races. It's all very tight, I'm not sure there will be big chunks of time to find. Mercedes are on the similar path to Mckaren in catching up.

[M840TR]

So out of curiosity. Do we expect another big upgrade package? Mercedes is upgrading like crazy and we havent had a good upgrade since Miami.

All teams have been upgrading, Mckaren have brought stuff ladt races. It's all very tight, I'm not sure there will be big chunks of time to find. Mercedes are on the similar path to Mckaren in catching up.

The second batch of McLaren upgrades have started since Austria where a new front wing and front suspension fairings were introduced. The logical sequence to that would be a new floor, specifically the front fences, 'bargeboards' and perhaps side winglets etc. Expect some parts in Hungary and perhaps Spa.

[venkyhere]

The tyre choice was not Landos call. That's pretty clear.

While, the mediums would have been better, I'm sure the team thought the softs, on low fuel only 12 laps would be the best option. Maybe they thought the car would look after them. Or would be out in front of Lewis and manage them.

I think the car was tuned for more downforce than Mercedes and the rest. That's why they were so fast in the rain. But this also caused overheating and high wear on Lando’s soft tires when he aggressively tried to catch up with Lewis

I would like to contribute a few more things to the strategy discussion. The decisions are of course wrong in retrospect, but in many wet/dry tire discusions the conclusion where let the driver make the choice. This circuit is very extrem. I don`t know if I remember corectly, but I saw a .31 lap right after a .39 lap. And I am still sceptically if the bigger wing from SA on was right.

We are going in circles discussing the used S v/s fresh M call made.
As I mentioned many posts ago, we are not discussing the most important aspect of tyre life - the outlap.
Look at this data, which shows the entire intermediate stint as well as the start of the final slicks stint :



See what Lando does on his outlap with the S he had - he is gunning it like anything, while Lewis on his S and Max on his H were far gentler. Lando's outlap was 3-4s faster than them. This is with the extra 2s he lost not stopping properly in the pitbox. That means Lando was hammering the tyre 6s faster than Lewis and Max in his outlap. That's where he lost his tyres. The decision by pitwall wasn't bad (to go for used S) and it was not a case of "Lewis made the S last more than what it was capable" - none of that. Lando chewed his tyres and paid the price.

[BMMR61]

Agreed that outlap is important to propagate good wear, this is more important the softer the tyre, as well as of course, the distance required. The radio comms sounded very panicked, and I agree that Will's way of posing the tyre question was absolutely wrong. Oscar despite his far less experience was in no doubt he was going onto a new set of mediums, the winning strategy.

The driver/race engineer relationship is important and not something you can just hire new personnel for. From memory Will has been with Lando since 2019 but it doesn't seem to have worked well. Ferrari changed Charles' race engineer recently and the results haven't been encouraging, not that that is the issue. Lando's personality is starting to look like an issue and bringing in someone who can be more assertive and strong may be something they should consider. When you compare the two drivers radio calls, and you can go back as far as you like, Lando sounds like the excitable rookie and Oscar the seasoned pro. If this sounds like Lando bashing and I don't like him, you're wrong on both counts. It's just looking like cool heads need to prevail and some personal management needs to be brought to bear. As I said before, bring in the ice cool Finn for a chat.

[mwillems]

The tyre choice was not Landos call. That's pretty clear.

While, the mediums would have been better, I'm sure the team thought the softs, on low fuel only 12 laps would be the best option. Maybe they thought the car would look after them. Or would be out in front of Lewis and manage them.

I think the car was tuned for more downforce than Mercedes and the rest. That's why they were so fast in the rain. But this also caused overheating and high wear on Lando’s soft tires when he aggressively tried to catch up with Lewis

I would like to contribute a few more things to the strategy discussion. The decisions are of course wrong in retrospect, but in many wet/dry tire discusions the conclusion where let the driver make the choice. This circuit is very extrem. I don`t know if I remember corectly, but I saw a .31 lap right after a .39 lap. And I am still sceptically if the bigger wing from SA on was right.

We are going in circles discussing the used S v/s fresh M call made.
As I mentioned many posts ago, we are not discussing the most important aspect of tyre life - the outlap.
Look at this data, which shows the entire intermediate stint as well as the start of the final slicks stint :

https://i.imgur.com/6B3npou.png

See what Lando does on his outlap with the S he had - he is gunning it like anything, while Lewis on his S and Max on his H were far gentler. Lando's outlap was 3-4s faster than them. This is with the extra 2s he lost not stopping properly in the pitbox. That means Lando was hammering the tyre 6s faster than Lewis and Max in his outlap. That's where he lost his tyres. The decision by pitwall wasn't bad (to go for used S) and it was not a case of "Lewis made the S last more than what it was capable" - none of that. Lando chewed his tyres and paid the price.

You can see in the data you have produced that the track was evolving at a rate of a couple of seconds per lap by that point as it dried up. Lando stopped one lap later and his outlap was 2.549 seconds faster than Hamilton and 3.471 seconds faster than Max, who's hard tyres would be slower to warm up. Both of their outlaps were one lap before.

All well within tolerance of an evolving track and I don't think indicative of anything else, in my opinion.

[AR3-GP]

You can see in the data you have produced that the track was evolving at a rate of a couple of seconds per lap by that point as it dried up. Lando stopped one lap later and his outlap was 2.549 seconds faster than Hamilton and 3.471 seconds slower than Max, who's tyres would be slower to warm up. Both of their outlaps were one lap before.

All well within tolerance of an evolving track and I don't think indicative of anything else, in my opinion.

In my opinion it was not just the outlap which did damage. Lando set 2 fastest laps of the race in a competition with Verstappen who was on a more durable tire. Hamilton never troubled the fastest lap of the race.

[mwillems]

You can see in the data you have produced that the track was evolving at a rate of a couple of seconds per lap by that point as it dried up. Lando stopped one lap later and his outlap was 2.549 seconds faster than Hamilton and 3.471 seconds slower than Max, who's tyres would be slower to warm up. Both of their outlaps were one lap before.

All well within tolerance of an evolving track and I don't think indicative of anything else, in my opinion.

In my opinion it was not just the outlap which did damage. Lando set 2 fastest laps of the race in a competition with Verstappen who was on a more durable tire. Hamilton never troubled the fastest lap of the race.

https://i.postimg.cc/qRgm1x8p/image.png

I'm sure he was in general pushing a little bit more for that last stint, but of course he had to, he was the one chasing. There was no point going on to softs to not try to catch Hamilton and he had a reasonable margin to close with only limited laps.

It seems without a doubt that the tyres weren't able to give Lando what he needed, but he did absolutely need to push, that is unquestionable. I don't see that he was setting a blazing trail though. Ultimately, If the tyres can't push there was no point in using them, and that is what this comes back to, for me. Softs was the wrong choice and this for me is on the team, and not Lando nor his attempt to close the gap, which was the whole point of the softs, according to the team.

[AR3-GP]

You can see in the data you have produced that the track was evolving at a rate of a couple of seconds per lap by that point as it dried up. Lando stopped one lap later and his outlap was 2.549 seconds faster than Hamilton and 3.471 seconds slower than Max, who's tyres would be slower to warm up. Both of their outlaps were one lap before.

All well within tolerance of an evolving track and I don't think indicative of anything else, in my opinion.

In my opinion it was not just the outlap which did damage. Lando set 2 fastest laps of the race in a competition with Verstappen who was on a more durable tire. Hamilton never troubled the fastest lap of the race.

https://i.postimg.cc/qRgm1x8p/image.png

I'm sure he was in general pushing a little bit more for that last stint, but of course he had to, he was the one chasing. There was no point going on to softs to not try to catch Hamilton and he had a reasonable margin to close with only limited laps.

It seems without a doubt that the tyres weren't able to give Lando what he needed, but he did absolutely need to push, that is unquestionable. I don't see that he was setting a blazing trail though. Ultimately, If the tyres can't push there was no point in using them, and that is what this comes back to, for me. Softs was the wrong choice and this for me is on the team, and not Lando nor his attempt to close the gap, which was the whole point of the softs, according to the team.

Yes, it's a little bit of a catch 22 isn't it .

My impression was that Mclaren and Mercedes were as close as they have ever been so Lando trying to outdrive Hamilton would never lead anywhere other than the way it did (tire deg). The best chance to win would be going to mediums but a win would not have been out of the question with a normal 2 second stop for softs (which did not happen). It would have just meant Hamilton and Norris would have to battle on the track for it, which would have also made it harder for Hamilton to manage his own tires.

Perhaps in that event, Verstappen would have caught both...

[mwillems]

Certainly Lando would be closer to the winner and no worse than third if the stop had gone well.

I agree though, it was a catch 22 for Lando as he had no way to get the performance he needed from the tyres.

But that's old news now, on to the next race and we get to have another go

[CjC]

Certainly Lando would be closer to the winner and no worse than third if the stop had gone well.

I agree though, it was a catch 22 for Lando as he had no way to get the performance he needed from the tyres.

But that's old news now, on to the next race and we get to have another go

In-flipping-deed please
I’m just itching to hear if Mclaren are planning on bringing any performance upgrades to Hungary.
I’d imagine they have some circuit specific low drag options for Spa though