🔗 Share this article

Do McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That if You Want Win, You Can't Always Play Fair?

McLaren are well aware of the difficulty they confront with Max Verstappen and the Red Bull team in the championship battle this year, but they don't believe to alter their method to running the team.

They will continue to give both drivers the best chance they can and operate the team on a foundation of equity and equanimity.

"This represents the manner we plan racing. This remains the method in which we approach competition, and we aim to remain fair, and we intend to apply equality to both drivers."

Team boss Andrea Stella is a seasoned expert of many championship fights. He claimed the championship as engineer to Kimi Raikkonen in 2007 when the Ferrari driver recovered 17 points under the previous points system in two races to win the championship, while McLaren collapsed.

And he lost the championship as engineer to Fernando Alonso in 2010, when the Ferrari team made errors in their strategy at the final race of the season and allowed Sebastian Vettel and the Red Bull team to sneak the championship from under their noses.

Andrea Stella said after the race in Texas: "We look at the next five races as opportunities to extend the lead on Max. And when it involves having to make a decision as to a team driver, this will only be led by the numbers."

"We lean on the past experience. I can recall at least 2007, the 2010 season, in which you reach the final Grand Prix and it's in fact the third-placed driver that wins the championship. So we're not going to make decisions unless this is closed by the calculations."

Why Did McLaren Cease Upgrades on This Year's Car?

Every team this year have had to confront the conundrum of for how long to concentrate on their 2025 car while also making sure they are as prepared as they can be for the major rules overhaul coming for 2026.

In Formula 1, it's usually the case that if a constructor gets it wrong at the beginning of a new rules cycle, it can take a considerable period to recover. And if they succeed, that benefit can last for a while - consider Red Bull in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the regulations were modified.

The McLaren team started this year with the best car, after investing a lot of innovation into their 2025 design.

They continued to improve it for a while, but were finding diminishing returns. So when evaluating the value for money they were achieving on their 2025 season car compared to 2026, it became an easy decision to switch focus to next year.

Red Bull have closed the gap since bringing their updated floor and front wing at the Monza Grand Prix, but the McLaren car remains competitive - team boss Andrea Stella said he thought Norris had the speed to compete for the victory in Texas had he not ended up behind Leclerc.

"We just have to keep optimising the performance and keep delivering strong weekends. And from this point of view, if you think of a Grand Prix like Baku City Circuit, we failed to optimize the performance and we didn't deliver a flawless race."

"So definitely we have a significant opportunity, and the result of this championship and the driver's title is in our hands. It's not placed in someone else's hands."

Driver Transfers: How Difficult Is It to Change Constructors?

First of all, I'm not sure the question has an completely correct premise. It's correct that both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz had somewhat sticky first halves of the championship, in varying manners, and that they are now faring much better.

Sainz and Alex Albon currently look quite balanced. However, it's not so clear that, in Lewis Hamilton's case, he is yet the "match" of Leclerc - or not consistently, anyway.

Lewis Hamilton has not beaten Charles Leclerc frequently at all this season, either in qualifying or Grand Prix.

He is now significantly nearer than he was. He is regularly qualifying within a few hundredths of a second of Leclerc, but in qualifying it's four-two to Charles Leclerc since the summer break.

This last weekend in Austin, on one of Hamilton's favourite circuits, he was a second behind Leclerc when the Monegasque completed his pit stop, and lost thirteen seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

In hindsight, Charles Leclerc was on the best race strategy. Regardless, over the season, and even currently, it's difficult to argue that on balance Leclerc has hasn't been the superior Ferrari driver this season.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz have discussed how difficult it is to change constructors, and we have to take them at their word.

Lewis Hamilton would not say even now that he was fully adapted to Ferrari - and he is expecting the new rules next season will benefit his driving style; he has never really enjoyed these ground-effect vehicles.

There is a lot for a racing driver to get their head around when they switch teams, as Hamilton has explained many times this year. But not every driver struggle in this way.

Fernando Alonso, for example, was performing well from the start of the 2023 when he moved to Aston Martin. And would Verstappen struggle if he switched teams? I believe the majority in Formula 1 would expect not.

How Soon Can We Determine The Coming Season's Team Performance?

Before the F1 cars are driven for the first time in pre-season testing next season, no-one will know how the constructors are looking in the upcoming season.

The initial session, in Catalunya on 26-30 January, is behind closed doors because the constructors wanted to understand their initial track time of the new engines without the scrutiny of the press.

So the pair of sessions in Sakhir on 11-13 and February 18-20 will be the first time a certain indication of comparative speed emerges.

But, as always, it's only at the season opener that the true and accurate situation will emerge.