2024 Mclaren Formula 1 Team

[BMMR61]

https://i.imgur.com/Y3TI9Yt.png

Really weird first stint. Both McLaren's so slow but here it's Lando vs Leclerc vs Max.

Leclerc and Max both display a normal progression of pace. They start at a certain level, Leclerc a bit faster because he wants to break DRS. Then they both stabilize to a certain level of pace and from there their laptimes get progressively slower the deeper into the stint they go right until they pit.

Lando on the other hand, starts out with horrible performance, getting faster and faster as the stint progresses, until he too (not shown in this graph because it happened a couple of laps later), starts showing signs of tire wear and gets slower before he pits.

Other than those first 15 laps, Lando was on par or faster than Leclerc, discounting the laps stuck behind Max. Hard to gauge the second stint, because of the 5 lap tire delta, but I imagine without that it would have been on par with Leclerc.

Very bizarre car behavior. Perhaps some weird problem with taking too long to get the tires at the right operating window. Maybe an over-correction via the setup in a bid to try and improve the tire wear problems they saw in the sprint.

If it wasn't for that huge slump at the start, Lando would have overcut Max with pace alone, so it's frustrating that they couldn't get the car into the right window. The sprint format really screwed them because they did not hit the ground running from the get-go like RedBull and Ferrari did.

In the first stint, Piastri said on the radio that his graining cleared up around the time the car started lapping at the same pace as the leaders. It does seem like a problem getting into the window.

It's common for McLaren to be much harder on it's tyres relative to it's opposition before picking up pace with the fuel load going down while others are losing pace. There's a number of factors in play here and it can be hard to unpick which are most powerful. I think the Pirelli tyre choice favoured Ferrari for starters, they handled the mediums better but I do think because of the slow start they had to the weekend McLaren underestimated the progress the Saturday setup changes had made. By lap 20 Lando's times were coming down and Max was going the other way, the Ferraris - forget it!

By stint two both McLarens were coming alive. It escaped most people's attention that despite his unhappiness with the setup all weekend Oscar was matching Lando's times, that is catching Max but probably decided to keep a watching brief given all things. The team did a good recovery job from Friday where it looked like we would be poor in qualifying and race pace, certainly vulnerable to the Mercs - imagine P6/7! So I'm pretty impervious to all the whining and huffing and puffing about McLaren dropping the ball, if this was a bad weekend I'll take it. I think Mexico is another chance for podiums even if Ferrari seems to have settled the ship. We need to keep focussed on the WCC, Ferrari will be the big threat there.

[Emag]

https://i.imgur.com/Y3TI9Yt.png

Really weird first stint. Both McLaren's so slow but here it's Lando vs Leclerc vs Max.

Leclerc and Max both display a normal progression of pace. They start at a certain level, Leclerc a bit faster because he wants to break DRS. Then they both stabilize to a certain level of pace and from there their laptimes get progressively slower the deeper into the stint they go right until they pit.

Lando on the other hand, starts out with horrible performance, getting faster and faster as the stint progresses, until he too (not shown in this graph because it happened a couple of laps later), starts showing signs of tire wear and gets slower before he pits.

Other than those first 15 laps, Lando was on par or faster than Leclerc, discounting the laps stuck behind Max. Hard to gauge the second stint, because of the 5 lap tire delta, but I imagine without that it would have been on par with Leclerc.

Very bizarre car behavior. Perhaps some weird problem with taking too long to get the tires at the right operating window. Maybe an over-correction via the setup in a bid to try and improve the tire wear problems they saw in the sprint.

If it wasn't for that huge slump at the start, Lando would have overcut Max with pace alone, so it's frustrating that they couldn't get the car into the right window. The sprint format really screwed them because they did not hit the ground running from the get-go like RedBull and Ferrari did.

Leclerc was doing a lot of lift/coast during his second stint; his pace during that second stint was not representative of the Ferrari's pace when pushing.

You may have noticed that Sainz was closing the gap to Leclerc (until the final 5 or so laps) despite having older tires; that's not because Sainz's pace was superior but because Leclerc was managing.

There is no obvious LiCo visible in the data, but I'll take your word for it, assuming you've heard it from a reliable source. There are a bunch of bad laps, but most due to traffic.

But anyway, Charles had no incentive to push and I did say the second stint is not representative. Lando was much faster than Carlos when in clear air as well and Carlos did have an incentive to push. That's why it's relatively safe to extrapolate that without the tire delta, pace would have been more or less the same with Leclerc, as it was on the mediums once they got rolling.

They lost out massively in the first 15 laps of the first stint, way more than usual, because they are usually slow on the first couple of laps even on races where they have been great. But it has never taken that many laps to get the car in the optimal operating window and also the deficit on the building up phase has never been as big as it was in Austin (~1 second per lap).

Other than that, pace was decent. Might not have been as great as Ferrari, but it was not as far off as the gaps suggest. There is no way Lando would have won that race either way after dropping to P4 in lap 1, but if they didn't have that horrible first phase it would have given them options to overtake Max via strategy (undercut or overcut) instead of being forced to do it on-track.

[bananapeel23]

Imo opinion watching it I knew Lando was gunna get a penalty because of how the stewarts ruled earlier incidents.
After been pushed wide Lando should of let Max pass out ahead of that corner and by the rules Max would of got the Penalty.

Think Alonso would of backed off so Max got the penalty, but Lando doesnt have that cunning yet of a Alonso or Max.

off topic, Piastri stocks have fallen imo. Lando is just faster in everyway.

1) Max, Lando, Lecerc
2) Hamilton, Alonso, Russel.
3) Sainz, Piastri, Hulk.

Piastri isnt in the top 6 of best drivers of this moment, just lacks about 2 tenths.

Lando is not in the same tier as Leclerc and Verstappen. Frankly Leclerc isn't even in the same tier as Verstappen either and I say that as a huge Leclerc fan. Lando might be just as quick, but his racecraft is horrific compared to either, especially Verstappen.

[Darth-Piekus]

Personally I rate Max's racecraft as completely crap. He is a bully and nothing more.

[Slahinki]

Imo opinion watching it I knew Lando was gunna get a penalty because of how the stewarts ruled earlier incidents.
After been pushed wide Lando should of let Max pass out ahead of that corner and by the rules Max would of got the Penalty.

Think Alonso would of backed off so Max got the penalty, but Lando doesnt have that cunning yet of a Alonso or Max.

off topic, Piastri stocks have fallen imo. Lando is just faster in everyway.

1) Max, Lando, Lecerc
2) Hamilton, Alonso, Russel.
3) Sainz, Piastri, Hulk.

Piastri isnt in the top 6 of best drivers of this moment, just lacks about 2 tenths.

Lando is not in the same tier as Leclerc and Verstappen. Frankly Leclerc isn't even in the same tier as Verstappen either and I say that as a huge Leclerc fan. Lando might be just as quick, but his racecraft is horrific compared to either, especially Verstappen.

What? Max has race craft at the level of an angry 12 year old on GTA Online. It's yield or we crash in it's entirety.

[bananapeel23]

Imo opinion watching it I knew Lando was gunna get a penalty because of how the stewarts ruled earlier incidents.
After been pushed wide Lando should of let Max pass out ahead of that corner and by the rules Max would of got the Penalty.

Think Alonso would of backed off so Max got the penalty, but Lando doesnt have that cunning yet of a Alonso or Max.

off topic, Piastri stocks have fallen imo. Lando is just faster in everyway.

1) Max, Lando, Lecerc
2) Hamilton, Alonso, Russel.
3) Sainz, Piastri, Hulk.

Piastri isnt in the top 6 of best drivers of this moment, just lacks about 2 tenths.

Lando is not in the same tier as Leclerc and Verstappen. Frankly Leclerc isn't even in the same tier as Verstappen either and I say that as a huge Leclerc fan. Lando might be just as quick, but his racecraft is horrific compared to either, especially Verstappen.

What? Max has race craft at the level of an angry 12 year old on GTA Online. It's yield or we crash in it's entirety.

This is a very odd take. His racecraft is absolutely incredible. He knows how to force mistakes out of his opponents. He is amazing at carving through the field. He has managed some of the most incredible tyre management drives ever (see COTA 2021). He is an absolute nightmare to overtake because he knows how to defend perfectly and clearly has a great understanding of how far he can push it without being penalised.

Whenever he pulls a "we crash or you yield" type move he benefits from it. That isn't because he's a spoiled baby, it's because he knows when it's worth the risk. See Monza 2021, Brazil 2021, Imola 2021, Austria 2024, Austria 2019.

[.Bole]

Lec was LiCO for like 20+ laps on Hards based on his team radio and they kept asking for it constantly until last 3 laps towards the end when he finally had clean air

[ScuderiaLeo]

1) Max, Lando, Lecerc
2) Hamilton, Alonso, Russel.
3) Sainz, Piastri, Hulk.

Piastri isnt in the top 6 of best drivers of this moment, just lacks about 2 tenths.

How do you compare drivers in midfield cars like the AM or Haas to drivers who are in the best cars? They rarely directly race each other and are aiming for different goals (points vs podiums).

There is no obvious LiCo visible in the data, but I'll take your word for it, assuming you've heard it from a reliable source. There are a bunch of bad laps, but most due to traffic.

Leclerc had to Lico a ton, according to his radios. You may be able to use Sainz as a comparison for this as he was not asked to Lico as much.

[Seerix]

going offtopic again

[Emag]

1) Max, Lando, Lecerc
2) Hamilton, Alonso, Russel.
3) Sainz, Piastri, Hulk.

Piastri isnt in the top 6 of best drivers of this moment, just lacks about 2 tenths.

How do you compare drivers in midfield cars like the AM or Haas to drivers who are in the best cars? They rarely directly race each other and are aiming for different goals (points vs podiums).

There is no obvious LiCo visible in the data, but I'll take your word for it, assuming you've heard it from a reliable source. There are a bunch of bad laps, but most due to traffic.

Leclerc had to Lico a ton, according to his radios. You may be able to use Sainz as a comparison for this as he was not asked to Lico as much.

Thanks for providing, I was checking only the laps towards the end and that's why I missed it. I see it now. Apparently Leclerc was told he could reduce LiCo after lap 41ish if we take the race engineer's information on Carlos doing a 37:8. Carlos never dipped into the 37s except for 41 and 42.

But yeah, Lando was faster than them both on free air at any time even when accounting for this, except for 2-3 laps where they were more or less matched. Of course all laps behind Max are much slower, but anyway, I said the second stint is hard to gauge anyway.

[Jurgen von Diaz]

Personally I rate Max's racecraft as completely crap. He is a bully and nothing more.

Racecraft crap? Fourth consecutive championship incoming, so it can't be that bad.