2023 - McLaren Formula 1 Team

[MTudor]

We out developed Mercedes&Ferrari in season,not RB who had a bullet pproof car and a penalty.

[mwillems]

Some public praise from Zak Brown to Stella and a nod to what he describes as the 9th fastest car at the seasons start to the second/third fastest at the seasons end.

It reminds me of the brick and tractor memes doing the round at the start of the season, I'd almost forgotten those oft repeated posts from Lucky in the first half of the season.

https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... Tj2uw.html

[mwillems]

And a report card for the various teams, not sure how reliable it all is but an interesting read for some.

https://www.foxsports.com.au/motorsport ... dc9cbdb616

[LionsHeart]

I'm not really sure how people measure the progress of one team or another over the course of a season. Yes, it's clear that you have to start from Red Bull, that's a good starting point. But their car also went faster during the season, not stood still all the time. Let's put it this way: if the difference between Red Bull and McLaren was 1.2-1.4 seconds in Bahrain, and by Brazil the difference in race pace was 0.150-0.2 seconds per lap, how do you know how much Red Bull itself went faster and gained time back from the very beginning of the season?

If you can get a more or less accurate idea of what Red Bull's progress has been, then you can relatively know McLaren's progress. But it's a bit simple.
The second point related to this: on some tracks McLaren was very strong and competitive and conceded to Red Bull very little, and on other tracks the difference in pace was more significant, although both teams by that time had already finished their work with the car and used only those aerodynamic packages that had already been previously presented by the teams.

Some tracks suited McLaren well, others not so much. Where they were good, the car was the second strongest and was second to Red Bull in speed and still inferior in tire wear over the race distance. Where the tracks were uncomfortable, McLaren slipped to 4th strongest car. I will say this, there is no stable base yet where the car is good in all conditions. This also affects how to extrapolate the time gained by the team relative to the undisputed leader.

[LionsHeart]

I read two news stories yesterday-today, from Lando and Zak. Zak said that the new powertrain contract will allow McLaren to influence some engine parameters, including the architecture of the arrangement in the chassis. That's what I might call like a semi-factory team. This is good for the team because it gives flexibility to the designers who need to intelligently integrate the engine into the chassis.

From Lando's interview I realized that Lando is satisfied with the way the work on the car of 2024 is going on, and also said that some of the developments we can already use at the start of the season, and others will appear later. Here it will be interesting to note whether the team will leave some kind of backup plan to use the experience of David Sanchez and Rob Marshall and already in 2024, say by mid-season to rebuild the car. Either way, they'll figure it out for themselves without me.

[mwillems]

I'm not really sure how people measure the progress of one team or another over the course of a season. Yes, it's clear that you have to start from Red Bull, that's a good starting point. But their car also went faster during the season, not stood still all the time. Let's put it this way: if the difference between Red Bull and McLaren was 1.2-1.4 seconds in Bahrain, and by Brazil the difference in race pace was 0.150-0.2 seconds per lap, how do you know how much Red Bull itself went faster and gained time back from the very beginning of the season?

If you can get a more or less accurate idea of what Red Bull's progress has been, then you can relatively know McLaren's progress. But it's a bit simple.
The second point related to this: on some tracks McLaren was very strong and competitive and conceded to Red Bull very little, and on other tracks the difference in pace was more significant, although both teams by that time had already finished their work with the car and used only those aerodynamic packages that had already been previously presented by the teams.

Some tracks suited McLaren well, others not so much. Where they were good, the car was the second strongest and was second to Red Bull in speed and still inferior in tire wear over the race distance. Where the tracks were uncomfortable, McLaren slipped to 4th strongest car. I will say this, there is no stable base yet where the car is good in all conditions. This also affects how to extrapolate the time gained by the team relative to the undisputed leader.

Those numbers looked a bit odd, Mclarens 1.234 seconds faster seemed like someone who wanted to find the numbers that were right next to each other to finish the article as quickly as possible.

The text was more interesting than the numbers which had no real definition of how someone came to define them and I agree, not sure how someone actually could find understand the actual differences of all teams as there is no fixed comparison, everything is a moving target.

[LionsHeart]

I'm not really sure how people measure the progress of one team or another over the course of a season. Yes, it's clear that you have to start from Red Bull, that's a good starting point. But their car also went faster during the season, not stood still all the time. Let's put it this way: if the difference between Red Bull and McLaren was 1.2-1.4 seconds in Bahrain, and by Brazil the difference in race pace was 0.150-0.2 seconds per lap, how do you know how much Red Bull itself went faster and gained time back from the very beginning of the season?

If you can get a more or less accurate idea of what Red Bull's progress has been, then you can relatively know McLaren's progress. But it's a bit simple.
The second point related to this: on some tracks McLaren was very strong and competitive and conceded to Red Bull very little, and on other tracks the difference in pace was more significant, although both teams by that time had already finished their work with the car and used only those aerodynamic packages that had already been previously presented by the teams.

Some tracks suited McLaren well, others not so much. Where they were good, the car was the second strongest and was second to Red Bull in speed and still inferior in tire wear over the race distance. Where the tracks were uncomfortable, McLaren slipped to 4th strongest car. I will say this, there is no stable base yet where the car is good in all conditions. This also affects how to extrapolate the time gained by the team relative to the undisputed leader.

Those numbers looked a bit odd, Mclarens 1.234 seconds faster seemed like someone who wanted to find the numbers that were right next to each other to finish the article as quickly as possible.

The text was more interesting than the numbers which had no real definition of how someone came to define them and I agree, not sure how someone actually could find understand the actual differences of all teams as there is no fixed comparison, everything is a moving target.

I agree with that conclusion. Otherwise it would be very easy and simple.

[BMMR61]

Well there's always going to be speculation and interpretation of results, times and stats in F1. But there's a number of shall I say, ill-informed or cherry-picked things being stated like they were facts in the discussion. I thought the picture looked pretty clear - as clear as you can be in F1 - to a McLaren fan trying to firstly, not throw the whole thing away, and then after July 2nd, not get ahead of my skis.

The 2023 car brought to Bahrain (and preseason testing) was NOT essentially a 2022 car (trying hard to downplay the achievements through 2023 season?). The speed difference in Australia was not of the order of 0.5 to Red Bull and the race result was flattering despite the circuit being somewhat a McLaren type of circuit.

The pre Austria pace and results were shocking, even the "Baku updates" didn't show any progress though it could be argued that these were fundamental to the updates in following weeks. Whether you measure the gap between McLaren in 2022 and 2023, or the in-season improvement (development), McLaren dramatically closed the gap in quite a sudden series of steps. Austria - hey we're getting back to fighting with the big boys, Silverstone - integration of what we just introduced given to both drivers on the perfect McLaren circuit, Singapore - start to deal with some of the previous deficiencies on an unfriendly, low speed circuit.

The circuit specific issues of previous seasons was greatly reduced and McLaren could rightly contend for 2nd or 3rd fastest car virtually anywhere. The top speed deficits that made overtake or be overtaken such a burden went away. The tyre degradation that challenged the performances in the race against the high expectations of a great grid position also went away - caveat, that this area is where we could see Red Bull were the most impressive.

You always need to measure pace against the others, not against last year's lap times. The gap closed by close to a second a lap, impressive, almost unbelievable. But there's more! The assurance that a previously long-underperforming team had in getting the car in a window after a poor Friday, moving to circuits which shouldn't favour it and being on the money (e.g. Hungary), and especially, rolling out a series of upgrades which ALL WORKED! There's something gelling at McLaren, we can say Las Vegas qualifying was an anomaly like Red Bull at Singapore surely. The pieces are being brought together systematically - or at least that's the impression being created.

There's the performance of two that caught my eye - Stella with his impressive marshalling of his people and the media appearances, and of course Oscar who is already a star with a huge future ahead. Not to dismiss the pace, and often race guile of Lando who needs to just take some of the weight of expectations off his shoulders and find better mind management support. Flaming` heck this is turning into an article! Just a really really impressive year and every realistic hope that 2024 will bring us closer to Red Bull who will not be caught in a year.

[MTudor]

9 races-17 points vs 13 races 285 points(second behind Redbull by points).
I guess this is a way to judge the teams progress during the year,in simple terms of corse.

[MTudor]

Well there's always going to be speculation and interpretation of results, times and stats in F1. But there's a number of shall I say, ill-informed or cherry-picked things being stated like they were facts in the discussion. I thought the picture looked pretty clear - as clear as you can be in F1 - to a McLaren fan trying to firstly, not throw the whole thing away, and then after July 2nd, not get ahead of my skis.

The 2023 car brought to Bahrain (and preseason testing) was NOT essentially a 2022 car (trying hard to downplay the achievements through 2023 season?). The speed difference in Australia was not of the order of 0.5 to Red Bull and the race result was flattering despite the circuit being somewhat a McLaren type of circuit.

The pre Austria pace and results were shocking, even the "Baku updates" didn't show any progress though it could be argued that these were fundamental to the updates in following weeks. Whether you measure the gap between McLaren in 2022 and 2023, or the in-season improvement (development), McLaren dramatically closed the gap in quite a sudden series of steps. Austria - hey we're getting back to fighting with the big boys, Silverstone - integration of what we just introduced given to both drivers on the perfect McLaren circuit, Singapore - start to deal with some of the previous deficiencies on an unfriendly, low speed circuit.

The circuit specific issues of previous seasons was greatly reduced and McLaren could rightly contend for 2nd or 3rd fastest car virtually anywhere. The top speed deficits that made overtake or be overtaken such a burden went away. The tyre degradation that challenged the performances in the race against the high expectations of a great grid position also went away - caveat, that this area is where we could see Red Bull were the most impressive.

You always need to measure pace against the others, not against last year's lap times. The gap closed by close to a second a lap, impressive, almost unbelievable. But there's more! The assurance that a previously long-underperforming team had in getting the car in a window after a poor Friday, moving to circuits which shouldn't favour it and being on the money (e.g. Hungary), and especially, rolling out a series of upgrades which ALL WORKED! There's something gelling at McLaren, we can say Las Vegas qualifying was an anomaly like Red Bull at Singapore surely. The pieces are being brought together systematically - or at least that's the impression being created.

There's the performance of two that caught my eye - Stella with his impressive marshalling of his people and the media appearances, and of course Oscar who is already a star with a huge future ahead. Not to dismiss the pace, and often race guile of Lando who needs to just take some of the weight of expectations off his shoulders and find better mind management support. Flaming` heck this is turning into an article! Just a really really impressive year and every realistic hope that 2024 will bring us closer to Red Bull who will not be caught in a year.

[mwillems]

9 races-17 points vs 13 races 285 points(second behind Redbull by points).
I guess this is a way to judge the teams progress during the year,in simple terms of corse.

We can see the gaps in fastest laps, Qualy laps etc and these offer a good way to see the difference between teams, especially when you average it between races at the start and end of season.

But the article offered finite time gains over a season, which is not possible to calculate. I suspect there is a calculation behind it that might make some sense, but the numbers in the article are essentially black box numbers.

Even before Singapore I think Stella suggested 1 second had been gained so after Singapore the gain is probably upwards of 1.2/1.3 seconds overall.

[BMMR61]

9 races-17 points vs 13 races 285 points(second behind Redbull by points).
I guess this is a way to judge the teams progress during the year,in simple terms of corse.

We can see the gaps in fastest laps, Qualy laps etc and these offer a good way to see the difference between teams, especially when you average it between races at the start and end of season.

But the article offered finite time gains over a season, which is not possible to calculate. I suspect there is a calculation behind it that might make some sense, but the numbers in the article are essentially black box numbers.

Even before Singapore I think Stella suggested 1 second had been gained so after Singapore the gain is probably upwards of 1.2/1.3 seconds overall.

I believe Stella was quoted as saying if they went back to Bahrain McLaren's pace would have improved by a little under a second. Yes I think it was just before Singapore so I am thinking they found about 1 second on average from beginning to end of the campaign. There's been some underplaying on this forum of what McLaren achieved, I don't greatly care, the results are on the board and it looks great and could easily have swung more towards the positive. Good analysis by Michael Lamonado on that FoxSports site, clearly showed that McLAren were winners even though they failed to win a Grand Prix.

I'm now more interested in looking forward to 2024 and another chance to draw back to the top step in F1.

[organic]

There were quotes from Lando and Stella saying the Austria package is what they should have started the season with, weren't there?

Wasn't it also reported in the winter that McLaren had continued developing in the direction that brought the Singapore 2022 update, but then realized too late for the beginning of the season that a big change in philosophy could result in much more fruitful development opportunities? Statements from the team members, Lando when the car launched seem to back this up. That they didn't expect to be competitive, had gone the wrong direction etc

Putting these together... is there not the implication that had they realized what the correct path was immediately in 2022 when rule changes for '23 were clear, they would have been able to start the season with the Austria/Silverstone car? Hence the feeling that such drastic mid-season improvement was possible because the launch car was a concept that had been long-abandoned?

To take such a step is nonetheless impressive because after all they went from 4th-5th quickest at the end of 2022 to 2nd-3rd quickest for the second half of '23. But the weak performance at beginning of '23 (further exaggerated by track characteristics of early calendar) is unrepresentative if we take the words of the team themselves imo

[mwillems]

9 races-17 points vs 13 races 285 points(second behind Redbull by points).
I guess this is a way to judge the teams progress during the year,in simple terms of corse.

We can see the gaps in fastest laps, Qualy laps etc and these offer a good way to see the difference between teams, especially when you average it between races at the start and end of season.

But the article offered finite time gains over a season, which is not possible to calculate. I suspect there is a calculation behind it that might make some sense, but the numbers in the article are essentially black box numbers.

Even before Singapore I think Stella suggested 1 second had been gained so after Singapore the gain is probably upwards of 1.2/1.3 seconds overall.

I believe Stella was quoted as saying if they went back to Bahrain McLaren's pace would have improved by a little under a second. Yes I think it was just before Singapore so I am thinking they found about 1 second on average from beginning to end of the campaign. There's been some underplaying on this forum of what McLaren achieved, I don't greatly care, the results are on the board and it looks great and could easily have swung more towards the positive. Good analysis by Michael Lamonado on that FoxSports site, clearly showed that McLAren were winners even though they failed to win a Grand Prix.

I'm now more interested in looking forward to 2024 and another chance to draw back to the top step in F1.

Singapore seemed like a big step to me, but it is all anecdotal, certainly it is on or upwards of a second.
My suspicions are more than this and closer to the 1.2/1.3 I offered before, and this is before you9 factor in the fact that RB were likely hiding some time at the start of the season.

[taperoo2k]

What do you mean we didn't. The car was 1.5 seconds off the pace and in one year we gained more than 1 second over them and they had to bring some updates as they couldn't stay completely still.

On another note what Zack did with Mercedes might give the team a huge boost. If he managed to get Mclaren in equal terms with Mercedes in engine development then he might have upgraded Mclaren to something more than a customer team. That looks like a works-type deal to me.

I think you need to temper your expectations, the RB19 was the class of the field in 2023. McLaren knew what the problem was at the start of the season with their car and followed a plan to rectify it alongside technical changes that have paid off.
For McLaren to have any chance at beating Red Bull they have to hit the ground running in 2024 and have found a development path that outsmarts Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari. It's a tall order.

As for the engine deal? It's not a works type deal, it's Mercedes being strategic as ever. Strong customer teams = data that can be used to improve the power units. Doesn't mean McLaren will benefit from that immediately.

I think you need to give credit to the team, they repeatedly extracted time from the car and improved it massively. Everyone knows what the car can and can't do, it's talent that fixes it and we did exactly that. I think it is also wrong to assume that if we'd started the season with the Baku spec, that the team still wouldn't have known how to find a big chunk of time, I think they know exactly how to keep improving this car beyond what they got to in Singapore.

The penalty for Red Bull certainly helped and I'm sure they will be faster than us next year, but nobody matched the Mclaren for in season development this year and if RB had brought one more big upgrade we'd still have made up a big chunk of time over the season I think.

You have to give credit to Zak Brown and the leadership at McLaren for fostering an environment that means McLaren engineers, designers, mechanics and pit crews etc can perform to their very best. If McLaren do manage to catch Red Bull in 2024, then having pit crews able to do sub 2 second pit stops will come in handy. McLaren know what they need to do for 2024.

Red Bull didn't really need to bring many updates to the RB19, given how quick the RB19 is and how Max seemed able to extract performance from the car when he needed it. Most of the time he was cruising to victory he was that far ahead. Newey appears to have shifted his focus onto the RB20 some time ago.

I hope McLaren are able to challenge Red Bull properly in 2024. I tend to think Oscar might well be the wild card if it's a fight between Red Bull and McLaren.