McLaren does not care about championship situation

McLaren team boss Andreas Seidl said that his squad puts its focus on improving its on-track performance, instead of desperately looking at the results and the championship standings.

McLaren has had a sensational season so far. The Woking-based outfit has retained its stellar form from the end of the previous season, and has made its car an "all-rounder" that performs on all types of track and does not rely on high-speed corners.

The British squad finds itself in third position in the Constructors' Championship, while its drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri occupy third and sixth spot in the drivers' standings. Despite the impressive results, team boss Andrea Stella urges his team to focus on the performance of its MCL38 instead of looking at the championship standings.

"As for McLaren, you know, we look at the classification, we see we are in a good position, we look at the plot of the points, we see we are in a good gradient.

"But the second after we do that, we forget and we think about what do we need to do now to be good at the next race? What do we do now to be good at the following races, delivering projects? So we don't really focus on outcome and results.

"We focus more on the process and on being always performance-focused, let's say, and delivery of projects. I think in Formula 1, if you focus too much on results, you may be easily carried away."

McLaren might have retained its form from the end of the end of last season, but its performance has been further boosted by the fact that Oscar Piastri managed to close the gap to his team-mate Lando Norris.

The Australian's performance fluctuated in his debut year, and he struggled for pace in races where tyre management played a big role.

However, Piastri has undoubtedly made a big step forward for this year. He has been able to match Norris' pace all through the season so far, and he was much closer to the Briton in races.

"And I have to say that they seem to be delivering an acceleration in Oscar's development. There's always underlying development, but in this case, both in terms of pure speed, which you can see in qualifying. And in terms of race craft, I think we have seen Oscar competing at a very high level and, like I say, an acceleration in his development.

Asked of how important experience has been for Piastri, Stella explained that knowing the tracks has been crucial for the Australian.

"Coming back to the same track is definitely important. There's a sense of familiarity. There's historical data. There's a lot of things that you review after year one.

"But in addition to that, it's also that you have more races that you do in Formula 1, more races to work with your engineers, more races to just understand what you need to work on. So I think it's not only the fact that you come to the same track for the second time, it's just the overall journey of development, which I have to say for Oscar is quite impressive.