2018 McLaren F1 Team - Renault

[tinvek]

hence why i said comfortably, on today's performance there's a second between red bull and renault, mclaren need to not only in that gap but be a lot closer to red bull than renault by late season. if they can do that i'd be happy for a first season with new packaging etc, but if they are more of a renault rival or more seriously, if they have noticeably worse reliability than the other renault powered cars, i will be disappointed.

Also please mclaren can we try and start to look a bit more mclaren and a bit less minardi ? (no offence intended i loved minardi), the pitstops errors in testing were amusing but there was a mix up on a right front in a race sim on friday and getting the gap wrong for alonso's q2 run as well was poor, be it team error, driver error or just not supplying alonso with the information he needed, this season looks like a close battle for 4th and little things like this will hurt, lets see more of the ruthless efficient organisation you have been in the past as at the moment i'd be worried if i found out my hospital had gone to you for help with organising how to treat accident victims in theatre.

[Phil]

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.

Why not compare them to end of season 2017 instead of their relative performance a full year ago?

[MMMMMMMM]

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.

True, we'll get an idea over the pace tomorrow. On a single lap though the MCL33 proved to 2-3 tenths behind the RS18.
Sainz actually managed a 1:23.061 in Q2 which is >0.5s better than any McLaren time.
End result: McLaren will start from 11th and 12th while Renault starts from 8th and 9th.

As a McLaren fan I'm a bit disappointed, but I want to believe the chassis development program is as exciting as Alonso is telling us it is. I was expecting to start in Australia somewhere in between RS and RBR. Let's face it Renault works struggled to snatch that fifth place in constructors last year from Toro Rosso, so in all honesty I don't think they have a 'great' chassis and coming to the first race of the new season and being out-qualified by them is not the start I was looking for.

On the positive note McLaren has improved almost 2 seconds a lap YoY in Australia which is the biggest progress in the last four years.

[loner]

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.

True, we'll get an idea over the pace tomorrow. On a single lap though the MCL33 proved to 2-3 tenths behind the RS18.
Sainz actually managed a 1:23.061 in Q2 which is >0.5s better than any McLaren time.
End result: McLaren will start from 11th and 12th while Renault starts from 8th and 9th.

As a McLaren fan I'm a bit disappointed, but I want to believe the chassis development program is as exciting as Alonso is telling us it is. I was expecting to start in Australia somewhere in between RS and RBR. Let's face it Renault works struggled to snatch that fifth place in constructors last year from Toro Rosso, so in all honesty I don't think they have a 'great' chassis and coming to the first race of the new season and being out-qualified by them is not the start I was looking for.

On the positive note McLaren has improved almost 2 seconds a lap YoY in Australia which is the biggest progress in the last four years.

well first of all Renault is not a world beater i thought RBR was your benchmark .. no ?!!
secondly Alonso said in 2016 that Honda is the fastest developed powerunit .. and he will say whatever people who provided him with 40 m $ per year ask him to say .. Honda is the one who pay Alonso salary for 2018 due to some electric technology they bought from Mclaren
reality in a nutshell you still 2.5s off Mercedes which was your disastrous rage about Honda and you will get lapped tomorrow and you can't have a top driver after 2018 and you just lost 100 m $ to develop the chassis and whatever else
patience is a virtue.

[the EDGE]

I think it’s fair to say McLaren have taken a step forward on power, a step backwards in intergration and stood still on chassis development whilst Renault & Haas have taken a step forward

I can understand integration taking time to optomise and hopefully this will be address soon, or at least by the summer break

What I don’t understand is why we are not seeing chassis progression. The speed Redbull manage to develop sets the standard and you can clearly see them thinking a step ahead and meeting that target every 6 months. McLaren seem to be at least 2 major aero development stages behind, running basically the same aero philosophy from 12 months ago

12 months ago it was a good package, and it’s been well developed, but I fear it’s been developed to its limit and I need of a major overhaul if they want to fight at the front again.

McLaren have it in them to do this, I just don’t understand what the hold up is. If they want to fight at the front again I think they need to start setting them selves higher targets and figure out how to meet them

[RonDennis]

Comparing last year doesn't make much sense, since most of the problems were solved at the end of the year. I'm a bit disappointed to be honest and this quali should put McLaren with their two feet on the ground. Talking about podiums, come on, they're not even close.

[ivanlesk]

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.

Why not compare them to end of season 2017 instead of their relative performance a full year ago?

What would we gain with that?

I think start 2017 <-> start 2018 and end 2017 <-> end 2018 would be fair comparison?

The didn't even do single race with new pu.

[BrunoH]

im a huge Mclaren fan, however they are the new Williams, no doubt about it now. So, i guess the optimists/ die hard defenders of the team are now going into hiding.

it was obvious since testing, at the time i said 1.5+ seconds from the top... i guess i was wrong, its much worse... there is no hiding it now.. not even Q3.

its a full disaster, they cant even change tires in practice, heat issues due to design errors, they did not even bring an updated engine cover to fix it, and i was sure they wold... all in all its even worse than i thought. plus like some people say, with less 100 million they are worse than they were before. last year they were q3 most of the end of the year.
that Eric Boullier needs to be fired! he hasn't done anything positive so far to fix the team. They are slacking, not good enough! that´s the reality.

they have huge drag issues ( dirty downforce and please dont come to me with comments like,, ´´haa and you know this from what? pictures? ) hahahahha i guess reality is stating to sink in....

[ivanlesk]

im a huge Mclaren fan, however they are the new Williams, no doubt about it now. So, i guess the optimists/ die hard defenders of the team are now going into hiding.

it was obvious since testing, at the time i said 1.5+ seconds from the top... i guess i was wrong, its much worse... there is no hiding it now.. not even Q3.

its a full disaster, they cant even change tires in practice, heat issues due to design errors, they did not even bring an updated engine cover to fix it, and i was sure they wold... all in all its even worse than i thought. plus like some people say, with less 100 million they are worse than they were before. last year they were q3 most of the end of the year.
that Eric Boullier needs to be fired! he hasn't done anything positive so far to fix the team. They are slacking, not good enough! that´s the reality.

they have huge drag issues ( dirty downforce and please dont come to me with comments like,, ´´haa and you know this from what? pictures? ) hahahahha i guess reality is stating to sink in....

You can say anything you want, off course
...

[Raleigh]

At the end of last season McLaren were in Q3 multiple times and were at least in the back of the FI/Williams/Renault group on race pace.

Right now they still look a bit behind Renault and Haas have replaced FI/Williams, that’s not by any means the performance jump McLaren was looking for.

[PhillipM]

Comparing last year doesn't make much sense, since most of the problems were solved at the end of the year. I'm a bit disappointed to be honest and this quali should put McLaren with their two feet on the ground. Talking about podiums, come on, they're not even close.

And comparing end of year would be even more useless because then you're comparing a refined car and engine package vs one that's literally just been put together in a hurry to fit a new engine.
Where they've qualified with a new engine and basic car should be nothing but cause for optimism - especially given where the Torro Rosso is that are also running under the same circumstances.

[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.

Why not compare them to end of season 2017 instead of their relative performance a full year ago?

I compared them on the Australia basis. Where were they at the start of last year and where are they in the start of this year.

[McMika98]

Every 21 cars on the grid has a new chassis, a new engine and new tyre compound. The competitive landscape is similar to end of last year with Williams falling massively to competition from end of last year.

Time is ticking for Mclaren and Zak, pre season we had daily news on motorsport media that the new engine would push them to the top and fighting podiums. After preseason testing they had to tone down the expectations and now live with reality of not being able to match the top 3.
Having the glory of being the only team to make a loss last year, and now the news of having to compensate Honda with over 50 millions, the Sheikhs must not be pleased to throw their money. For Mclarens sake they must be top 4 by barcelona else next year budget will be SLASHED.

[proteus]

im a huge Mclaren fan, however they are the new Williams, no doubt about it now. So, i guess the optimists/ die hard defenders of the team are now going into hiding.

it was obvious since testing, at the time i said 1.5+ seconds from the top... i guess i was wrong, its much worse... there is no hiding it now.. not even Q3.

its a full disaster, they cant even change tires in practice, heat issues due to design errors, they did not even bring an updated engine cover to fix it, and i was sure they wold... all in all its even worse than i thought. plus like some people say, with less 100 million they are worse than they were before. last year they were q3 most of the end of the year.
that Eric Boullier needs to be fired! he hasn't done anything positive so far to fix the team. They are slacking, not good enough! that´s the reality.

they have huge drag issues ( dirty downforce and please dont come to me with comments like,, ´´haa and you know this from what? pictures? ) hahahahha i guess reality is stating to sink in....

Where were they at the start of the 2017 season? That is all i am asking.

[PhillipM]

Every 21 cars on the grid has a new chassis, a new engine and new tyre compound.

Tweaks to an engine evolution that was already in planning is nothing like swapping to a completely different unit when your chassis work has already started.
They've come to the first race of the season with a brand new engine and shown the car has the pace to make it into Q3 already, - okay, they didn't because Alonso messed his lap up, but the pace was there - and the engines haven't exploded a dozen times.
I would bet the team and sponsors you're referring to are very bloody happy rather than downbeat.