2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[mwillems]

Oscar is just a little bit inconsistent and he struggles when following in the dirty air. The car is bad with handling dirty air in general but Lando deals with it quite a bit better.

Anyway, looking forward to Monza now. A very important test for the car and the team. If they remain in the hunt for the win at a track like that, then there’s no reason why they can’t be competitive in all of the remaining races.

Would also be interesting to see if Ferrari joins the fight at the front again with their rumored upgrade package.

Regarding the very first sentence. The problem here is not the car, but only Oscar. He wants a lot from the tires to stay close to his rival. And thus he kills his tires, instead of taking a breather, as Lando did. Oscar also attacked aggressively to catch up first with Russell, and then with Leclerc. There were not enough tires to make another attack. The pace of the cars simply equalized. I think Oscar needs to accelerate a little smoother, and not attack with all his money at once.

Indeed. Lando will take his time on the long approach, prioritise arriving with a full battery and cooler tyres. He's not stressing the tyres when behind a car by trying to be as close as possible. He picks his overtaking opportunity and then it begins, throwing everything in to try to get it done quickly. If it doesn't work after a couple if tries he backs off to a 2 to 3 second gap and then goes again.

Oscar will possibly not be able to keep his tyres as cool on the long approach and when close, seems to be always looking for opportunities, always harassing. It looks nice, but it seems not very efficient. The tyres don't get a breather and eventually lose their life.

To be fair, it's something Lando has only started doing since the car improved last year, but there is some racecraft and tyre management still to go.

It works better at some tracks than others and I think a small part it is experience of the track.

[LionsHeart]

Oscar is just a little bit inconsistent and he struggles when following in the dirty air. The car is bad with handling dirty air in general but Lando deals with it quite a bit better.

Anyway, looking forward to Monza now. A very important test for the car and the team. If they remain in the hunt for the win at a track like that, then there’s no reason why they can’t be competitive in all of the remaining races.

Would also be interesting to see if Ferrari joins the fight at the front again with their rumored upgrade package.

Regarding the very first sentence. The problem here is not the car, but only Oscar. He wants a lot from the tires to stay close to his rival. And thus he kills his tires, instead of taking a breather, as Lando did. Oscar also attacked aggressively to catch up first with Russell, and then with Leclerc. There were not enough tires to make another attack. The pace of the cars simply equalized. I think Oscar needs to accelerate a little smoother, and not attack with all his money at once.

Indeed. Lando will take his time on the long approach, prioritise arriving with a full battery and cooler tyres. He's not stressing the tyres when behind a car by trying to be as close as possible. He picks his overtaking opportunity and then it begins, throwing everything in to try to get it done quickly. If it doesn't work after a couple if tries he backs off to a 2 to 3 second gap and then goes again.

Oscar will possibly not be able to keep his tyres as cool on the long approach and when close, seems to be always looking for opportunities, always harassing. It looks nice, but it seems not very efficient. The tyres don't get a breather and eventually lose their life.

To be fair, it's something Lando has only started doing since the car improved last year, but there is some racecraft and tyre management still to go.

It works better at some tracks than others and I think a small part it is experience of the track.

Well, as some people have said, Oscar has a long way to go. Experience comes with experience. He can do it.

Lando is doing a strong job on the racing sections. Let's just say I was surprised that on the Hard tyres he kept gaining ground, it even seemed like he was going to make two pit stops. And even then he managed to save a little bit of tyres and battery to get the fastest lap on the last lap. Encouraging.

If the car suits Lando's style very well, with optimal balance and handling, then it's no wonder why Lando has become more consistent in qualifying. And if the chassis allows for better tyre conservation, then it's worth using an undercut against your rivals in every race.

[mclaren111]

[Nicktendo86]

A quick question: in the past the McLaren drivers were contractually obliged to hand over their original trophy's to the team. Is that still the case nowadays? Or do drivers get to keep the trophy's?

It is still the case. Not sure if they make replicas or something.

I believe the circuit can provide replicas but the driver has to pay for them. I’m sure I read Lando obv wanted one for his Miami win and had to pay something like £60k for it

Edit: found the link https://www.gpblog.com/en/news/275812/n ... o-buy.html

[Ben1980]

I am sure I heard on tv coverage that Lando talked about his Qualifying lap. Saying he knew that he didn't need to push it too far, or it would become harder. And that keeping it under 100% was how he got thr best lap.

I know it was mentioned his previous issues pushing too hard and causing errors. Mauve he is learning or maybe it's having a car you don't feel the need to push it over the limit.

[Lucky]

An interesting article
https://formu1a.uno/it/mclaren-ha-una-s ... replicare/
Use a translator

[FittingMechanics]

We've talked of high level signings that were coming into the team. I think we can safely say that they are paying off.

[Ben1980]

Interesting in that about if pitting Oscar early it would have forced Max to pit to cover meaning it was harder for Lando overall

[mwillems]

Regarding the very first sentence. The problem here is not the car, but only Oscar. He wants a lot from the tires to stay close to his rival. And thus he kills his tires, instead of taking a breather, as Lando did. Oscar also attacked aggressively to catch up first with Russell, and then with Leclerc. There were not enough tires to make another attack. The pace of the cars simply equalized. I think Oscar needs to accelerate a little smoother, and not attack with all his money at once.

Indeed. Lando will take his time on the long approach, prioritise arriving with a full battery and cooler tyres. He's not stressing the tyres when behind a car by trying to be as close as possible. He picks his overtaking opportunity and then it begins, throwing everything in to try to get it done quickly. If it doesn't work after a couple if tries he backs off to a 2 to 3 second gap and then goes again.

Oscar will possibly not be able to keep his tyres as cool on the long approach and when close, seems to be always looking for opportunities, always harassing. It looks nice, but it seems not very efficient. The tyres don't get a breather and eventually lose their life.

To be fair, it's something Lando has only started doing since the car improved last year, but there is some racecraft and tyre management still to go.

It works better at some tracks than others and I think a small part it is experience of the track.

Well, as some people have said, Oscar has a long way to go. Experience comes with experience. He can do it.

Lando is doing a strong job on the racing sections. Let's just say I was surprised that on the Hard tyres he kept gaining ground, it even seemed like he was going to make two pit stops. And even then he managed to save a little bit of tyres and battery to get the fastest lap on the last lap. Encouraging.

If the car suits Lando's style very well, with optimal balance and handling, then it's no wonder why Lando has become more consistent in qualifying. And if the chassis allows for better tyre conservation, then it's worth using an undercut against your rivals in every race.

I think Oscar is making very good ground. A few races I think he has got it perfect this year. But there is more to do.

The Mclaren does seem to get better on lighter fuel loads, more so when looked at relative to other cars. It's not unusual to see the best performance from Lando in the second half of the race. Whether that is setup, design or a combination of the two, I don't know. But even last year in the second half of the season the Mclaren we doing very well with tyre wear, only at the time it was being put down to the "heat treated" tyres giving the tyre super-tyre properties..

For me, this trait of the tyres maintaining performance is more normal than not. Partly from the car and partly from the driver. The car does seem to naturally favour the harder compounds too, or at least circumstances where the tyres are not reacting so much to temperature. More so than our competitors.

[mclaren111]

We've talked of high level signings that were coming into the team. I think we can safely say that they are paying off.

Seems Rob Marshall & Peter Prod is working very well together again...

[BMMR61]

I don't want to create the impression of always jumping to the defence of Oscar, I defend both 'our' drivers whenever I feel the criticism is a little (or a lot) unfair. There has been an overreaction to Lando's supposed failings and speculation that Oscar is the better driver, suddenly it has swung the other way, what is the better analysis?

Lando turned in a stellar qualifying lap in Q3 at the second go, Oscar got a bit caught out by having to back out of the ideal preparation lap, but fair to simply say Lando aced it. He usually pips Oscar at this stage of the weekend, the margin is usually around or less than 0.1. In the race both cars suffered over aggressive clutch take-up, one could come up with a number of possible reasons. Track conditions over wet weekends tend to catch out teams and drivers, Zandvoort was no exception with the Sargeant further disrupting practice by the loss of most of one session. This may have contributed to McLaren overestimating the grip on the 'clean' side of the grid.

The key thing that destroyed Oscar's race is that he had to do something Lando didn't - pass a Ferrari. The Red Bull was an easier car to pass with it's barn door rear wing affecting it's top speed. The Ferrari was a different proposition - Carlos had no problem disposing of Checo's Red Bull. Oscar did a great job on Russell's Mercedes and were it not for great defence by Charles he would have been challenging Max well before the end of the race. This is not to say Lando wasn't the quicker McLaren driver this weekend - it obviously was the case that Lando was on another planet this weekend. We need to expect this will tend to seesaw about at different tracks, the main thing is the team keep banking good points and beat Red Bull to the championship.

[FittingMechanics]

Oscar still struggles a bit with overtaking, driving in dirty air and tyre management. That is to be expected of someone who is in only his second year. He is doing good. He will find his way.

I've checked out the launch of both cars using f1-tempo and it looks like Lando did a bad start, you can clearly see him get on throttle too much (compared to Oscar) and then release a bit, not once but two times. Oscar doesn't have those "backing off" moments and it almost looks like he was affected by Norris bad start.

F1-Tempo doesn't show a clutch trace so no idea on that part.

[CjC]

An interesting article
https://formu1a.uno/it/mclaren-ha-una-s ... replicare/
Use a translator

Correct me if I’m wrong but to me in the last paragraph the journalist suggests the Zandvoort update is the start of many updates that will provide a ‘leap’ in performance by the end of the season?

[BMMR61]

Autosport's JBL teases that McLaren have concentrated their upgrade efforts towards second half of the 2024 season.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WYeos8TwZI

Every time McLaren arrive with major upgrades they work effectively and noticeably so. Is the long awaited new wind tunnel proving to be the hero of McLaren's surge to the top?

[Macklaren]

i fully acknowledge that this is premature BUT....Lando said in the post race press conf that he thinks he would have won in Zandvoort even without the latest upgrade. We have seen that a car that was last updated in Miami was still very competitive until the summer break. If McL win in Monza and Azerbaijan by a large margin, the team should think about holding back remaining upgrades until 2025 so as to not tip our hand for next year's car. and also use 2025 wind tunnel time (which will be lower because we finish P1/P2 in WCC this year) for the '26 regs? Save some budgt cap money too?