2018 McLaren F1 Team - Renault

[ivanlesk]

2.5 second gap to Mercedes, the gap to the front hasn't closed at all. Looks like McLaren made no improvement with the Renault power unit, and they're out 100 million.

Give time to TR and McL and you will see improvements.

[Bisonas]

Driver error, but TBH, Renault Hass and McL are very close and we should see fair amount of fight between them.

It was a Team error that led to a driver error.
As official commentary on the live f1 app noticed, he bottled up behind Sainz and others on his out lap, he complaint that "It will be a disastrous out lap" on the radio, obviously he didn't manage to warm up the tires as he would like and that led to a very bad S1, decent but not his best S2 ans his best S3 time. Overall a bad lap.
He would be in the very low 1.23 around 7-8th place i guess if all where normal on his out lap.
The thing is that it was not bad. He was very fast when all where on Inters on FP3 and that shows a very balanced car besides a talented driver of course.

Mclaren Haas and Renault are in did very close on Qualifying trim on AUS.
Race Pace we will see tomorrow.

Overall i am optimistic. I think from Barcelona onward Mclaren will be best of the rest on every race. Qualifying and race. I my eyes they may already be best of the rest. Passing is not easy on AUS and we don't know how the new DRS zone will play out, so it may not be shown tomorrow but overall its not that bad.
But the road to reach the top 3 teams will be hard and long.

[the EDGE]

2.5 second gap to Mercedes, the gap to the front hasn't closed at all. Looks like McLaren made no improvement with the Renault power unit, and they're out 100 million.

Give time to TR and McL and you will see improvements.

I’ve forever been the optimist as far as McLaren are concerned but I think today is the day we have to admit they are in big trouble

Sure, given time they’ll find the .5 needed to lead the midfield, but nearly 2 secs behind RB Can not be ignored

[max_speed]

I am also bit surprised. Mclaren was easily the 4th fastest team today. Was surprised to see alonso finishing 11th for sure some errors.but gap to front is too big. No hope till 2021.

[RonDennis]

Not really surprised to be honest. After Alonso said the first races were going to be tough, you already know how late it is.

[MMMMMMMM]

2.5 second gap to Mercedes, the gap to the front hasn't closed at all. Looks like McLaren made no improvement with the Renault power unit, and they're out 100 million.

You would call -2s/lap no improvement ? Here is some numbers to digest.

Q3 2018 v Q3 2017:

All teams improved their qualy times compared to last year bar Toro Rosso.
Average improvement per lap is about 1s (-0.94s to be precise)
McLaren (-1.8s) and Sauber(-1.9s) improved the most.
All Renault powered teams improved by at least -1.5s/lap

Mercedes -1.0 sec
Ferrari -0.6 sec
Red Bull -1.6 sec

Force India -1.0 sec
Renault -1.5 sec
Haas -0.9 sec
Williams -0.2 sec

McLaren -1.8 sec

Toro Rosso +0.1 sec

Sauber -1.9 sec

[Ground Effect]

2.5 second gap to Mercedes, the gap to the front hasn't closed at all. Looks like McLaren made no improvement with the Renault power unit, and they're out 100 million.

Look on the bright side, they could have been knocked out in Q1...

[Fer.Fan]

2.5 second gap to Mercedes, the gap to the front hasn't closed at all. Looks like McLaren made no improvement with the Renault power unit, and they're out 100 million.

Look on the bright side, they could have been knocked out in Q1...

I agree, problem was not only Honda PU, car is bad as it was 2017. They lost 100 million of Honda sponsorsship and are paying for Renault PU with no improvment at all. 2,5 second to pole time and not even in Q3.

[max_speed]

McLaren keeps fighting with the same issue from winter tests. Literally.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201803 ... 4cd0c5.jpg

Enviado desde mi Moto G (5) Plus mediante Tapatalk

could this be the reason for 11th place finish. in last laps everyone ahead managed to deploy "party mode" but mclaren can not because of heating issues ?.

[bauc]

Alonso says McLaren's qualifying pace "a relief"

Fernando Alonso admitted he was relieved about his McLaren Formula 1 team's competitiveness in qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix, despite missing out on a Q3 slot.
Alonso was knocked out in Q2 after setting the 11th fastest time, but could move up to the top 10 if Valtteri Bottas is sent to the back of the grid following his heavy crash during the final qualifying segment.

The McLaren driver finished 2.5 seconds off Lewis Hamilton's pole position time, but insisted his first qualifying session with the Renault-powered MCL33 had been positive.

The Spaniard says the fact that McLaren still has progress to make on the integration of the power unit means the Woking team has a lot of potential to move up the grid.

"I'm very happy with how qualifying started. You are always curious to know where you stand and I think we have been pretty fast, especially in FP3 in wet conditions we were very close to the top all the time," said Alonso.

"Then in Q1 and Q2 we were always between seventh and 12th and as a starting point that's great because we'll have a lot of updates from now and the integration we need to do.


"We are the only ones who have to do that - so we have 'free' upgrades that are going to make us a lot more competitive and so it was a relief to reach qualifying and see that it's going to be a good year."

When asked if he expected a season-long fight with rival Renault, he said: "Now yes, but not all season."

Not having reached Q3 means Alonso can choose the tyre compound he wants to start tomorrow's race with, but he said in this case that will not be a major benefit.

"With the tyres we know that you always use the softs to start because they are better to start, you have better performance on the opening lap and there'll be little degradation as all three tyres are very similar so there's not a lot to play with there.

"We'll start 10th, I guess, because Bottas will be last, so I think it's a good starting point."

[proteus]

To all people who feel the need to bash right now, lets have a bit of insight of the result this year and the ones from last year:

In 2017 Alonso qualified 13th and Stoffel 18th, this year they are 11th and 12th. - we leave all of what it could be
In 2017 both STRs qualified 8th and 9th, this year they are 16th and 20th. - unfortunatly the drivers are not the same

Last year Alonso was behind Sainz for almost a half a second in Q2 (about 0,3 in Q1), this year Alonso was almost a second infront of Hartley in Q1.

In my eyes they have gained ground. And i expect they wont need to save fuel tomorrow.

Its far from great, but celebrating how they failed is not in place just jet.

[Alonso Fan]

Ah come every one flipping over driver error. If people actually watched the session instead of just looking at the results it would make much more sense.

Pace on inters was awesome

[tinvek]

for the record i've been a mclaren fan since fittipaldi drove for them and, for me, the problem is mclaren have once again set them selves up with a very hard target to hit.

most of last year they repeatedly claimed they had the best car, now they have the same power unit as red bull, they have to prove that claim. it's obviously early days in the relationship but if they're not competing with the red bulls regularly by the latter part of the season, it will be seen by many as a fail to some degree.

Given the late(ish) decision to go renault, i'd give them a bit more slack this year but they should be comfortably quicker than the works renault team by the later races and close to red bull

[Alonso Fan]

for the record i've been a mclaren fan since fittipaldi drove for them and, for me, the problem is mclaren have once again set them selves up with a very hard target to hit.

most of last year they repeatedly claimed they had the best car, now they have the same power unit as red bull, they have to prove that claim. it's obviously early days in the relationship but if they're not competing with the red bulls regularly by the latter part of the season, it will be seen by many as a fail to some degree.

Given the late(ish) decision to go renault, i'd give them a bit more slack this year but they should be comfortably quicker than the works renault team by the later races and close to red bull

They're already quicker than the works Renault team I think

[makecry]

for the record i've been a mclaren fan since fittipaldi drove for them and, for me, the problem is mclaren have once again set them selves up with a very hard target to hit.

most of last year they repeatedly claimed they had the best car, now they have the same power unit as red bull, they have to prove that claim. it's obviously early days in the relationship but if they're not competing with the red bulls regularly by the latter part of the season, it will be seen by many as a fail to some degree.

Given the late(ish) decision to go renault, i'd give them a bit more slack this year but they should be comfortably quicker than the works renault team by the later races and close to red bull

They're already quicker than the works Renault team I think

We will get a proper idea tomorrow. I am not sure about it though. But MCL33 is a better chassis than RS18 for sure. Matching or being so close to the works team within such a short period of time is very commendable.