Good interview with Stella here:
https://it.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-st ... /10665788/
Some quotes:
"The aerodynamic package brought to Austria was achieved with the same infrastructure that was available in previous years, we did not yet have the new wind tunnel and new CFD systems for aerodynamic development, there was no new composite materials department, as well as no new simulator. Well, the same people were able to produce a major leap in performance. "The upgrades in infrastructure came after the close of 2023, so the subsequent development in Singapore was also studied and carried out with the methodologies, tools and people who up to a certain point in the previous season had not been able to put a competitive car on the track."
Pretty much what we already knew but it's good to definitively know the timeline and that none of the new infrastructure benefited the '23 car.
In the first five races you paid a 99-point gap to Red Bull. What couldn't you focus on at the beginning of the season?
"There is a very rational explanation. The upgrades we brought in Austria and Singapore 2023 allowed us to close a huge performance gap, about a second, but in order to do that we used a lot of the gasoline we had in the tank at the knowledge level, and that had an impact on the 'launch' car for the 2024 season. If we take the Red Bull example, we see that during 2023 they brought less development to the track, so they accumulated a lot of ideas and knowledge that was poured into the 2024 car. The evaluation of a team's development should be observed over a long enough period to overcome these fluctuations, which also depend on when new things are brought to the track."
Didn't any alarms sound after the first five races of the season?
"There was no concern, when we put the 2024 launch car on the track, noting that Ferrari and Mercedes over the winter had made a bigger leap forward than ours, we didn't worry too much. We were actually the fourth force in the field, but at the same time we saw in the development going on in the background that we kept improving, and when it came time to bring the updates to the track, on the Miami weekend, we made the leap forward that we expected."
So much for the reporting that McLaren were surprised by how good the upgrades were. I never believed this narrative anyway. With how successful they have been it seemed obvious to me they were delivering what McLaren intended and expected.
"At this stage of the season, it is clear that the 2024 program is basically closed, this does not mean that we will not see new things for the next races, but the development program is finished. The activity of most of the team has shifted to the 2025 project, but at the same time, as the work in the wind tunnel and CFD for the 2026 car will start from January 2, there will be phase an advance of work to allow us next January 2 to press the green button and start the development work. This is what happens in a Formula 1 team, I must say that it is easier now than a month ago, when we had three strands of development happening under one roof, as work on the current single-seater was still operational."
How much did the controversy over the Baku wing bother you?
"Our wings complied with the technical regulations and passed all the flexibility checks in place, at the same time we had conversations with the International Federation receiving all the appropriate reassurances. Of course we read a lot of comments in the media, opinions that came mainly from our opponents, not necessarily from journalists, and certain articles seemed to be a vehicle to spread the word [of] some of our opponents on the track."
He says that all the focus on their wings is psychological warfare from their opponents attempting to put the team in a bad light, which to a certain extent has worked, I think.
He also talked about driver management and an English version of those quotes can be found here:
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mcla ... /10665836/
