Can McLaren make the next step to challenge for F1 titles again?

“Can McLaren do an Aston?” We posed that question on the cover of our 18 May 2023 issue. Now, entering 2024, we’re asking whether the orange team might soon do rather better: could it even rival Red Bull in the upcoming Formula 1 campaign? 

That the question can be posed at all says so much about the 2023 season just gone for McLaren. The team had a reliability nightmare across Bahrain testing and the opening race there last year, and a car that struggled to escape Q1 in many of the early rounds, yet ended up fourth in the constructors’ championship. It eventually finished comfortably clear of Aston Martin, which had made its own big jump over the winter and was significantly more competitive in the early events.  

“We’re sitting in fourth in the championship because we’ve been a blend of ninth quickest to second quickest, so we’ve averaged into where we are,” points out McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown. “But I think we ended stronger than where we anticipated. That gives us a lot of energy and excitement in the off-season.” 

Indeed, McLaren scored 215 points through the final half of last year’s 22-race season. Other than Red Bull, only Ferrari (with 239 points) headed it over the final 11 events of 2023. Mercedes, which ended up second in the constructors’ results, brought in just 186. It can be argued that, without McLaren’s slow start in 2023, things might have ended up being a lot closer between these three squads, albeit far off Red Bull. 

McLaren went from “zero to hero” and “a terrible start to the year”, because “we called our shot”, reckons Brown. This meant weathering the storm of those tricky opening races. It’s worth remembering how even in May’s Miami round, one race after the eagerly awaited floor and rear-wing updates had arrived for its cars, the team had a double Q1 exit and finished 17th and 19th in the grand prix.  

Things were “not as bad as we feared” behind the scenes, according to Oscar Piastri, now heading into his second year as team-mate to established McLaren star Lando Norris. For Brown and the senior management he’d seen change considerably through late 2022, with Andreas Seidl’s departure for Sauber and Andrea Stella promoted into his place as team principal, this period was all about being “confident in our data”.

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

McLaren was uncompetitive in the early stages of 2023 before its package of updates kicked in

“I think what is good is we knew we weren’t going to be strong immediately,” Brown adds. “It would have been a worse situation if we thought we were going to be strong and we weren’t and we’d be scratching our heads.  

“We said, ‘Heads down, stay focused’. I think, as leaders – myself, Andrea, the leadership team – we had to stay strong and had to believe. We had to get everyone believing, but we did believe. It was about not letting them see you sweat. Underneath, we were sweating!”  

The overall minor Baku update was followed by a comprehensive change to the MCL60, with floor, sidepod, engine cover and internal cooling alterations coming at the Austrian GP at the beginning of July, then another new floor among other refinements for Singapore in September. The July package transformed McLaren’s season. Brown says that such a gain – which resulted in nine GP podiums after Austria – had to be carefully targeted in the cost-cap era.

"In the past, when there was no budget cap, if you needed a new front wing you could invest in 10 of them to get one. Now, you can really only invest in one, so you have to get it right" Zak Brown

“You need to spend your money wisely and [ensure] you are getting maximum performance,” he explains. “But I think it demonstrates it can be done.  

“In the past, when there was no budget cap, if you needed a new front wing you could invest in 10 of them to get one. Now, you can really only invest in one, so you have to get it right. What that has shown is there is no reason you cannot make big leaps forward; you have just got to be more confident and precise. You cannot throw money at the problem.” 

Heading into 2024, then, F1 knows that Mercedes and Ferrari will be starting afresh on the Red Bull-inspired downwash sidepod car concept – they have so far been able only to partially emulate it thanks to large parts of the overall architecture of their designs, such as suspension systems, needing a full winter reset. This will have a knock-on for costs, given the parts carryover allowances of the current rules era, but it puts them on a course that Red Bull has proved has a higher potential development ceiling.  

At McLaren, the team has been running the pushrod rear/pullrod front suspension arrangement Red Bull has deployed since the start of the new ground-effect era. Red Bull technical director Pierre Wache admitted late in 2023 that such an approach is “a big part of it [why the Red Bull concept is so good]”.  

It would not be a shock, then, to see the 2024 Mercedes and Ferrari challengers appear with this arrangement, which frees up rear floor area in a way that improves aerodynamic efficiency. Another key development element that makes the Red Bull package so strong is its potent DRS opening for a straightline speed benefit. McLaren has been trying to replicate this via its beam wing focus since the Spa race on the eve of the 2023 summer break. 

Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images

McLaren emerged as Verstappen's closest challenger in the second half of 2023 as it recovered to fourth in the constructors' standings

After seeing the enduring, stressful hope in the MCL60’s development become so successful last year, when the upgrades did arrive as planned, Stella says his team’s campaign ended up being far better than imagined. Given McLaren is so much more on the Red Bull development path than Mercedes and Ferrari, that’s a strong position to be in entering the new year. 

“[Last year] just exceeded the expectations because they were for a journey of ‘assessment, put in place, plan for the future, make the moves that look obvious with what we have, but ultimately we will need some support from employments from outside,’” Stella explains.

“But, in reality, for me the main point is that what happened in 2023 is that we put the talent that we already had available at McLaren in condition to deliver. That’s, for me, the main process that has happened. Because, everything we have seen, basically has no contribution from the important steps that we’ve made in terms of creating the McLaren of the future. Employing David Sanchez [as technical director, car concept and performance], Rob Marshall [as technical director, engineering and design] and so on.

Often in F1, when you think about improving for the future, you normally say ‘it’s going to take like two years, it’s going to take [long-term thinking]’. But, credit to the people at McLaren, and credit to some of the key people that were part of this reorganisation. They created the conditions to unleash the talent that was available at McLaren.” 

That work involved some pain, with former technical director James Key departing after just two races last year. But Brown is clear that Stella’s effort on overhauling McLaren’s technical structure to recover from what he calls “late” and “ineffective” 2022 car upgrades was critical to the team’s subsequent success a year later. 

“He has done an outstanding job,” Brown adds. “He has been awesome. That is obviously about what has happened on the track but also the culture that he has created, the way he has empowered people, the way he has got the most out of people, the leadership he is providing – he is a fantastic leader.  

“He’s a people person. But don’t be mistaken by his soft demeanour, he is tough. Tough, demanding, fair, leads by example. All the classic things you want in a great leader, that is Andrea. He is very articulate and it makes him a great communicator so he doesn’t talk gibberish. Whether it is to the media [or anyone], he is clear and concise with the messages he delivers.” 

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Stella impressed Brown in his first year at the helm as team principal

Stella says he picked up his approach to F1 team leadership through his time working as a race engineer for Ferrari – first with Michael Schumacher and Kimi Raikkonen as a performance engineer, and then most famously for Fernando Alonso before both joined McLaren in 2015.

“When it comes to my leadership, already even when I was a race engineer, it was never only technical,” he explains. “As a race engineer, you have a fundamental element of human, personal factor, which is the driver. And then, as a race engineer, you manage the mechanics, you manage the engineering crew. You have important interactions with the top level of the team. You have to make important decisions that involve the pitwall.  

“Immediately, that role is quite overarching in terms of the aspects that you need to cover in F1. So, I’ve always said that the way I’ve interpreted my being a performance director [as Stella was for McLaren in 2018-19, after joining as head of race operations], then racing director, then team principal is based on the same principles that I developed in my job as a race engineer, just moving to a larger and larger scale. In particular, with putting our performance-oriented mindset as the real beacon of what we do. At technical, operational – all people-related levels.” 

Driver management is clearly going to be a notable feature of McLaren’s 2024 campaign. Firstly, because the driver market is surely set to be more interesting than in 2023

The Italian has also come in for much praise from the F1 press corps since his promotion. It was intriguing to see how a team principal thought not to enjoy the public communications side of such a role gave detailed, precise briefings throughout 2023.  

When Stella admitted “we’re not entirely happy for what is the launch car” at McLaren’s 2023 season presentation, eyebrows rocketed northwards around the ringed lecture-hall-cum-auditorium at the McLaren Technology Centre. But his additional “[we’re] optimistic that we should take a good step soon” comment was backed up in those Azerbaijan, Austria and Singapore gains. That did wonders for his reputation in an industry where obscurification is an accepted part of the game. An honest approach, Stella says, is the much better way to go. 

“I look at communications, I look at conversations with the media, the journalists, as a way of telling where we are in our journey,” he explains. “Which direction we are going, where we are coming from, and what we know about the present.

“I think sticking with just the most truthful description, reporting of what we know, is just the best approach. Eventually, I would rather say, ‘I cannot share this because I don’t want to give it away to our competitors or because it’s sensitive, or simply because I’m uncertain and I don’t want to offer an opinion just to show that I can talk about anything.’ I’d rather say [nothing]. 

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Stella has stuck by an approach of honesty which has earned him respect

“But, intellectual honesty, rigorousness – they are very important. And they are not important because they belong to me. They are important because they belong to our culture as a team. And belonging to our culture means that this is expectation from anybody working at McLaren. Intellectual honesty, rigorousness – acknowledging facts for what they are. Because once we know that, then we can do something about it. But creating after facts is just a short-lived approach.” 

Serious, stirring words in a serious game. But, did Stella enjoy his first year as an F1 team principal?

“Errrrm,” he replies – long pauses for pondering are a notable feature of this interview. “It’s definitely been very interesting. And, I have to say, I was enjoying it – this new experience in my professional career – even when the results weren’t very good on track! And this is because effectively the real motivation, the real enjoyment, I get in this job comes from the interactions with people.  

“What really gives me motivation, what really gives me the enthusiasm to go to work, is the sense of every day building something with my colleagues. And seeing my colleagues growing and seeing the team growing, is what gives me the joy. As I often say, ‘The results, they take care of themselves.’ I don’t have to think about results – they are good when they come, but they are not the obsession. The investment is all on the sense of growth. That’s the ‘ethos’, if you want.” 

Now comes the (even more) difficult second album for Stella. But in trying to close the remaining gap to Red Bull, plus overhaul Mercedes and Ferrari, he’ll do so with that now familiar driver line-up of Norris and Piastri. Both are locked down – despite all those theories on how Norris would make a great team-mate to Max Verstappen at Red Bull – for two more seasons together, three guaranteed at McLaren in Piastri’s case.

Norris’s most recent extension came in early 2022, while Piastri was handed a bolt-on to his existing two-year deal only nine months into the first season. The 22-year-old Australian says it was “a no-brainer to extend it early” and “an easy decision on both sides”. “Certainly, no pressure from our side to get it done so early,” Piastri adds. “But definitely a nice thing to put your mind at ease for even longer than it was.” 

Driver management is clearly going to be a notable feature of McLaren’s 2024 campaign. Firstly, because the driver market is surely set to be more interesting than in 2023, with possible spots opening up across the field. But also because of how the team viewed the mistakes that came with its success in the second half of 2023. 

Norris blew chances for even better results in Qatar and a possible pole shot in Abu Dhabi, saying over his team radio after Friday qualifying at Losail that “I’m just so shit sometimes”. Stella was moved to say at the season finale that the 24-year-old Briton “just seems very harsh on himself”. But Norris insists “as much I get annoyed with myself on Saturdays at times and people are like, ‘You shouldn’t beat yourself up’ and all of that stuff, a lot of my best performances come then on that next day”. 

Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

Piastri has been tied down to a new deal by McLaren after his impressive rookie year, with the team now boasting one of F1's strongest lineups

Minimising mistakes is an ever-present art for drivers, but Stella also acknowledges that Norris helped McLaren by not reacting to the “stress” his team principal says he’s feeling at seeing his early-career rivals – such as Carlos Sainz and George Russell – become F1 race winners. McLaren will at least have Norris heading into 2024 off the back of what he calls “my best year” in F1 and “our best year as a team”. The biggest issue, though, in any hope of a true new challenge to Red Bull comes from Verstappen and his squad also having statistically their best year in 2023.

As the end of last season approached, McLaren was the most vocal agitator over Red Bull’s plans for closer ties with AlphaTauri from the start of this year. Brown says he has “big concerns over the alliance” and that the “common ownership, which you wouldn’t have in other sports” could potentially make Red Bull even stronger around the few performance areas where the RB19 could have been even better, particularly the low-speed handling issue Red Bull wants to iron out and AlphaTauri successfully did by the end of last year.

Red Bull, via team principal Christian Horner, insists that everything it and AlphaTauri are doing – as part of a bigger drive to make the junior team more cost-effective for the parent company – is “totally within the regulations”. But this was a tantalising exchange with which to end last season and throw forward to the upcoming one.  

"For the start of the year we have all of our technology, infrastructure in place now. But just now, and the 2024 car started a while ago" Zak Brown

Was McLaren making noise as early sabre-rattling ahead of the sort of close, possibly bitter, scrap F1 enjoyed/endured (delete on your partisan point of view) between Red Bull and Mercedes in 2021 over various rules elements? Or was it laying down an early excuse marker should the 2024 pecking order be soon revealed as broadly similar to the one that ended 2023? 

Since we’ve praised McLaren’s honesty across last year, and have no logical reason to see otherwise for now, the team has to be taken at its word. But there are some things that should seem slightly more alarming to anyone hopeful of a multi-team title fight of which McLaren should theoretically be a part, given how many of these messages are stacking up. 

There was Stella’s public wondering of “have we embedded in this development [path], which certainly gave good grip, some elements of possibly the car just losing too much grip too rapidly in some conditions?” after Norris’s qualifying woe in Abu Dhabi last year. There, Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari and Russell’s Mercedes ended up as Red Bull’s closest challengers, after Norris’s fellow
Briton had fought ahead of the McLaren pair.  

And then there’s this conclusion from Brown: “For the start of the year we have all of our technology, infrastructure in place now [with McLaren’s refurbished MTC wind tunnel, new simulator and manufacturing capability completed last summer]. But just now, and the 2024 car started a while ago. Then we have a few new hires coming that will be added to that. So come 2 January, we will have everything we need. People, technology, etc.  

“However, with the six-month lead time, Bahrain [planning] started three or four months ago. So, we are not missing much, we will have it all in January, but that is six months behind the start, so we will be in really good shape in 2024 and have everything we need for 2025…”

Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images

Norris beat Verstappen to sprint pole in Brazil, but will he be able to make that a trend in 2024?

Piastri lets his driving do the talking

Oscar Piastri had a fair amount of competition when it came to the prospect of being Formula 1’s latest rookie of the year – in numbers terms at least, with Logan Sargeant and Nyck de Vries also making their bows in 2023. But soon, and with de Vries gone from consideration even before the halfway point of the season, it was clear that Piastri was the sole contender. 

But did McLaren’s low-key start last year provide him with the chance of doing his learning away from the limelight for at least a portion of his first campaign, as so many future superstars have done with backmarker squads over the years?

“It didn’t really,” Piastri says in an interview with Autosport’s Matt Kew. “Because, of course, I was still always going to be compared to Lando – whether we were fighting for last and second-last or first and second. But maybe in terms of outright results, maybe there wasn’t quite the pressure to achieve big points or podiums or whatever straight away.” 

Piastri has quickly formed a reputation in the F1 press pack for giving little away. It’s a headline writer’s chagrin, but there’s a method at play that harks back to the court case with Alpine that McLaren had to endure over securing certainty of his services. 

“I think this also comes across in my radio,” he says of his media approach. “There’s no point getting upset or emotional about things you can’t control, but it’s much better to try and fix things that you can control than just get upset about them. So that’s kind of always been my way of trying to tackle these things and just trying to keep a clear mind.

“I think, at the same time, I’m also very new to the sport and, especially in the first half of the year, I felt like I had enough controversy and headlines on my way into F1. I certainly wasn’t in a rush to cause any more. Just try and let my driving do the talking.”

Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

Piastri keeps his own counsel in dealings with the media