2025 McLaren F1 Team

[Seerix]

Heavy price paid for yesterday's quali. I don't think they could have done much except for maybe trying undercut with Lando, but I doubt it would have worked.
Swap in the end would only prevent Osc opportunity to try to overtake Lando, no way he could threaten VER with such low pace delta.

[CjC]

2 articles backing up my feelings that qualifying is becoming more than ever vital to the outcome of the race.

Vasseur thinks it could define the championship!
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/vasse ... /10710501/

Lando:
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/norri ... /10710464/

These opinions and the quali result in Japan is not appeasing my concerns from pre-season about the car being difficult to in quali.

These improvements need to come asap:
https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mcla ... do-norris/

[AriaanGert]

I was surprised by the lack of strategy. You could say: defensive strategy. McLaren would have known that this would be the outcome. So I thought: weren't they afraid to gamble and give up the advantage of Lan do over Oscar? At least the internal hierarchy has been maintained.

[Slahinki]

In Australia, people didn't like that they were told to hold for a couple laps, and it was all about let them race.

Now they could race, it's let's use team orders.

They were allowed to race here, that's a good thing isn't it?

It's all a bit silly, isn't it?

[Xyz22]

The race was lost during qualifying. Piastri had a bad first sector while Norris had a schocking last chicane.
You can't overtake in Suzuka unless you have over 0.5s pace advantage (and would still be difficult).

I also didn't understand why they pit Piastri first.

[CjC]

The race was lost during qualifying. Piastri had a bad first sector while Norris had a schocking last chicane.
You can't overtake in Suzuka unless you have over 0.5s pace advantage (and would still be difficult).

I also didn't understand why they pit Piastri first.

1.4 seconds advantage according to Mark:
https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mark ... tappen-f1/

[FittingMechanics]

Talk of Piastri having to pit to cover off Russel is wrong. Russel came out behind Alonso, Gasly and Tsunoda. When Piastri went to the pits he emerged about 4 seconds ahead of Russel and ahead of all three slower cars ahead of Russel (so ahead of ALO, GAS and TSU). Piastri could have waited for one more lap. In fact, Russel probably made quite a bad call because he emerged right behind that group.

If Norris went to pits one lap earlier, it's quite likely he would have undercut Verstappen.

[Balalu]

Nothing would have changed today's result in my opinion, except for MAYBE the undercut, which isin't a great deal around here.

I think Lando performs better after a "slap in the face", and this was a "slap in the face". I'm expecting Lando to be on it next weekend.

[FittingMechanics]

Nothing would have changed today's result in my opinion, except for MAYBE the undercut, which isin't a great deal around here.

I think Lando performs better after a "slap in the face", and this was a "slap in the face". I'm expecting Lando to be on it next weekend.

I hope the team doesn't look at it that way. There are at least two things that would have made this into a win.

1. Better qualifying by either car as both could and should have got pole and if they started on pole, they would probably win
2. Undercut by Norris against Verstappen or split strategy by the team to force Red Bull to make a tougher choice

If you think nothing could have changed the result, you will not learn from your mistakes. This was McLarens win to lose and they lost it.

Palmer was quite right during the race, he said by going Piastri and then lap later Norris, McLaren allowed Red Bull to cover off both McLaren cars with a single pitstop. Completely negating their strategy advantage.

[Balalu]

Someone said Mika was slightly slower than Schumacer. I disagree, Mika was just as fast, but not as mentally strong as Schumi. And this is exactly the advantage Max has over Lando.

As to Max outperforming his car, I really hate this narrative. NO ONE can outperform their machinary's ultimate capabilities, it is simply not possible. Max just got the best out of it in qualy and that won him the race.

In all honesty all top 3 positioned drivers, Max, Lando and Oscar performed flawlessly today under immense pressure.

[Balalu]

Nothing would have changed today's result in my opinion, except for MAYBE the undercut, which isin't a great deal around here.

I think Lando performs better after a "slap in the face", and this was a "slap in the face". I'm expecting Lando to be on it next weekend.

I hope the team doesn't look at it that way. There are at least two things that would have made this into a win.

1. Better qualifying by either car as both could and should have got pole and if they started on pole, they would probably win
2. Undercut by Norris against Verstappen or split strategy by the team to force Red Bull to make a tougher choice

If you think nothing could have changed the result, you will not learn from your mistakes. This was McLarens win to lose and they lost it.

Palmer was quite right during the race, he said by going Piastri and then lap later Norris, McLaren allowed Red Bull to cover off both McLaren cars with a single pitstop. Completely negating their strategy advantage.

I wasn't talking about qualy, and I never said they shouldn't have tried things. That is kind of obviously their job...

[littlebigcat]

I think there is a slight overreaction here. McLaren are able to get near peak performance out of their car at almost every race so far. Red Bull are struggling with a peaky car, that seems to like being unladen with dirty downforce.

[BMMR61]

I've had a chance to take a closer look and read Mark Hughes' race report and I was wrong to be critical of strategy in this case. The undercut wasn't on in the circumstances that McLaren were handed. The best chance turned out to be a faster pitstop. We didn't see Max's stop but it's said that it was 3.3 to Lando's 2.3 and we saw the result of that. If they had nailed the perfect 2.0 the pitlane pass would have just about been a reality.

[mvfad]

I would like to ask a question to all of you who follow McLaren closely... What is happening with Norris's race pace? He is clearly much slower than he was in the last two/three years. In previous years his race pace was much better than Piastri's. And so far, in the first three races Piastri seems to have had more pace overall. I don't think Piastri has improved that much, it seems to me that it was Norris who fell.

[FittingMechanics]

I've had a chance to take a closer look and read Mark Hughes' race report and I was wrong to be critical of strategy in this case. The undercut wasn't on in the circumstances that McLaren were handed. The best chance turned out to be a faster pitstop. We didn't see Max's stop but it's said that it was 3.3 to Lando's 2.3 and we saw the result of that. If they had nailed the perfect 2.0 the pitlane pass would have just about been a reality.

If you are talking about "Russel undercut" that is just plain wrong. Piastri was not under threat.