Is McLaren really off the pace?

[PlatinumZealot]

Hamilton said the '24 felt good - I believe him.. Bossing people around the track and kicking ass in Australia, china, malaysia - the car had to feel good.

[speedsense]

Not completely negative but from autosport:

Hamilton said the MP4-26 was not as bad as the team's 2009 machine, with which he struggled at the start of the season, but admitted it is currently lacking performance.

"The '09 was terrible because the car was hopping, three-wheeling through corners, it was locking up, and it had no downforce," Hamilton told Reuters.

"This doesn't lock up, it doesn't three-wheel and it handles really nice, better than last year's car, but it just doesn't have as much downforce...so that's where it feels weak.

"Hopefully we've got some more downforce coming onto the car before the first race."

Team-mate Jenson Button also conceded he was not blown away when he first drove the car, but he too is confident there is more performance to extract from it.

"When I first jumped in it (the car) the first reaction was not 'Wow, we're going to blow everyone away'. No," Button told Reuters.

"I don't think anyone would have felt that because it's got a lot less downforce, the tyres are working very differently to the previous tyre.

"But there's nothing that really scares me about the car in a negative way, so there's a lot we can improve with this car through general set-up work."

IMHO- if these two comments are all that's wrong with the Mclaren, than the car is much better than most of the press and rest think. Whitmarsh and Button did say that the new wings (Whitmarsh claimed new radical wings, the current front wing is very much like last years, the rear isn't too far away either). I would say that the floor, exhaust, diffuser have been tested WITHOUT intervention of their wing package for measurement of downforce individually. It's far too easy to change different wings in and out....

General set-up work is an "at the track" change as well.

I see nothing negative in any of these comments, but rather a car that should be quite fast once the intended parts are put together.

[raymondu999]

Didn't the MP4-25 start with the same front wing as the MP4-24 ended 2009 with too?

[speedsense]

Didn't the MP4-25 start with the same front wing as the MP4-24 ended 2009 with too?

Yes, I believe your correct, typical testing for Mclaren?

Though in 2010 testing, there was comments to the negative side on the car's mechanical balance and how it was unbalanced in aero in the rear...Not what we're hearing now, the car sounds mechanically balanced and not aero balanced.

Mclaren's first test this year was with last year's car, to isolate the tires. Did put them behind on the new car, but not without an understanding of the Pirelli tires.
Seems Mclaren does a lot of "isolation" testing, which IMHO is a very smart thing to do, especially when testing time is so limited. Putting a lot of new things together makes identification of problems highly difficult, especially in the aero dept.

[raymondu999]

Really? I thought Lewis was proud about how he could finally take turn 3 in Barcelona flat out.

[PlatinumZealot]

But unlike the redbulls he still couldn't take turn 8 in turkey flat out.

[McG]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 411112.stm

Both Hamilton and Button fear the car is off the pace and are looking for more from the car.. Hamilton said it's like their '09 car which was a dog.. except it's not bouncing or three wheeling..

Hamilton; "This car is closer to the '09 car in the sense of downforce. The '09 car was terrible as it was hopping, three-wheeling through corners, locking up, and it had no downforce."

For clarification.

[raymondu999]

Not many cars can. My point is, last year they weren't complaining about aero balance. At least not in testing.

[akshat21]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 411112.stm

Both Hamilton and Button fear the car is off the pace and are looking for more from the car.. Hamilton said it's like their '09 car which was a dog.. except it's not bouncing or three wheeling..

Hamilton; "This car is closer to the '09 car in the sense of downforce. The '09 car was terrible as it was hopping, three-wheeling through corners, locking up, and it had no downforce."

For clarification.

I think what he was trying to say is that the car has less downforce than last year's car. And in that respect, its similar to the 2009 car.

Just before the para quoted, he also said

This car doesn't lock up, it doesn't three-wheel, and it handles really nice, better than last year's car, but it just doesn't have as much downforce.

So all in all, I guess both drivers are saying the same thing. They haven't had enough miles with this car and still don't understand certain things.

[PlatinumZealot]

My greatest fear is that mclaren sucks at restricted single diffusers. In all the years with the 150mm diffuser height we had low DF.

They should just shamelessly copy the redbull at this point. All the teams that look like the redbull are faster than us now.

[Richard]

we had low DF. ...faster than us now.

Do you work for them, or are you taking this a bit too personally?

[i70q7m7ghw]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 411112.stm

Both Hamilton and Button fear the car is off the pace and are looking for more from the car.. Hamilton said it's like their '09 car which was a dog.. except it's not bouncing or three wheeling..

Hamilton; "This car is closer to the '09 car in the sense of downforce. The '09 car was terrible as it was hopping, three-wheeling through corners, locking up, and it had no downforce."

For clarification.

This right here, is how to take a quote out of context. He wen't on to explain how the 26 doesn't have the handling problems the 24 had.

[Goran2812]

My greatest fear is that mclaren sucks at restricted single diffusers. In all the years with the 150mm diffuser height we had low DF.

They should just shamelessly copy the redbull at this point. All the teams that look like the redbull are faster than us now.

you do realise that just copying wont do the trick right?

[dan]

button always whines about setup I think they will find some speed in it.. if not well at least they didn't just copy the redbull like everyone else

[Alge7a]

ladies and gentlemen. I just want to congratulate you on your ability to communicate without the debate turning in to juvenile slagging match as it does on all the other forums.especially when the word McLaren is mentioned. F1 technical is well written, good natured and the people here seem to have an excellent understanding of what f1 is all about. Many congrats. In regards to Mclaren being off the pace, i think this season will be different to 2010 and 2009. I think it will come together by europe and be competative. Hopefully neither Vettel or Alonso will have snapped up a run of races to make it hard to catch up.