2025 McLaren F1 Team

[Emag]

Well, it was 44 degrees track temp and McLaren was beaten by a Mercedes and could potentially gotten beaten by Max too if they had set their best lap on fresh tires.

Seems like that Bahrain FP3 gap was an overreaction after all ...

Both Red Bull and Mercedes have had upgrades since Bahrain.

Of course, but the gap at Bahrain FP3 was 0.7s
It was pretty clearly an overreaction of the paddock. It's nowhere near something that absurd. The car is still definitely better than others on higher temps, but not by some "crazy tire magic" amounts. Oscar lost sprint pole on the last chicane, whereas Lando had a bad first sector. Maybe overly cautious with a broken confidence from the weak performances last couple of races.

[AR3-GP]

Well, it was 44 degrees track temp and McLaren was beaten by a Mercedes and could potentially gotten beaten by Max too if they had set their best lap on fresh tires.

Seems like that Bahrain FP3 gap was an overreaction after all ...

Both Red Bull and Mercedes have had upgrades since Bahrain.

Of course, but the gap at Bahrain FP3 was 0.7s
It was pretty clearly an overreaction of the paddock. It's nowhere near something that absurd. The car is still definitely better than others on higher temps, but not by some "crazy tire magic" amounts. Oscar lost sprint pole on the last chicane, whereas Lando had a bad first sector. Maybe overly cautious with a broken confidence from the weak performances last couple of races.

There's a subtle point. Once the tires overheat, you lose a chunk of laptime all at once. So I believe it is a valid ranking when the others overheat their tires. We know that both Red Bull and Mercedes have worked specifically in the last month on this problem. It appears that they have made strides.

[Emag]

Both Red Bull and Mercedes have had upgrades since Bahrain.

Of course, but the gap at Bahrain FP3 was 0.7s
It was pretty clearly an overreaction of the paddock. It's nowhere near something that absurd. The car is still definitely better than others on higher temps, but not by some "crazy tire magic" amounts. Oscar lost sprint pole on the last chicane, whereas Lando had a bad first sector. Maybe overly cautious with a broken confidence from the weak performances last couple of races.

There's a subtle point. Once the tires overheat, you lose a chunk of laptime all at once. So I believe it is a valid ranking when the others overheat their tires. We know that both Red Bull and Mercedes have worked specifically in the last month on this problem it appears that they have made strides.

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

[AR3-GP]

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

[Emag]

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Let's see tomorrow. I think this car should have been on sprint pole today regardless. Nothing to take away from Kimi, that was a brilliant lap, but Oscar did lose it all on the last corner there (where Lando actually gained on Kimi), so piecing everything together, Kimi's lap wouldn't have been enough to beat McLaren.

[AR3-GP]

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Let's see tomorrow. I think this car should have been on sprint pole today regardless. Nothing to take away from Kimi, that was a brilliant lap, but Oscar did lose it all on the last corner there (where Lando actually gained on Kimi), so piecing everything together, Kimi's lap wouldn't have been enough to beat McLaren.

Well maybe the car is the reason that Oscar couldn't put his final corner together. Isn't that what was being argued just 2 days ago? That it was not the driver's fault and the car is difficult to drive?

[Emag]

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Let's see tomorrow. I think this car should have been on sprint pole today regardless. Nothing to take away from Kimi, that was a brilliant lap, but Oscar did lose it all on the last corner there (where Lando actually gained on Kimi), so piecing everything together, Kimi's lap wouldn't have been enough to beat McLaren.

Well maybe the car is the reason that Oscar couldn't put his final corner together. Isn't that what was being argued just 2 days ago? That it was not the driver's fault and the car is difficult to drive?

I do think we get on pointless missunderstanding debates sometimes though. It's tough to extract tonality from text, so it's hard to know what exactly people mean just by reading. All I try to do is to maintain a more subdued perspective on the whole McLaren's presumed immense pace advantage this year. I never claimed they don't have the best car, because they do and the drivers have underperformed in my opinion (Lando substantially more than Oscar), however I am extremelly against picking random performances from non-representative and non-competitive sessions to build narratives about gaps.

[CjC]

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Oscar said after sprint quali that there was some more potential to un-tap. He never said if it was set up work or driver execution though.

[AR3-GP]

I think it's just a matter of a wider operating window, which of course it's not to be underestimated in itself. Nobody would be setting their cars up for a hot session in Bahrain, hence everybody's car overheating tires more when the sun was out. When everyone sets up the cars optimally for a hot track though (like here), the difference is not as extreme.

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Oscar said after sprint quali that there was some more potential to un-tap. He never said if it was set up work or driver execution though.

Zak Brown said similar, but that it goes for everyone else as well.

[CjC]

I should caveat that by saying it's a sprint weekend. Mclaren had one practice session. Maybe they didn't dial in the car. It happened to them at the last sprint weekend...

Oscar said after sprint quali that there was some more potential to un-tap. He never said if it was set up work or driver execution though.

Zak Brown said similar, but that it goes for everyone else as well.

That’s the caveat to your caveat
I didn’t hear Zak to be honest, I’ll look for what he said later

[Darth-Piekus]

Personally I enjoyed seeing Zak trolling Red Bull drinking Tyre Water. Brought a smile on my face after a hard day.

[Downforce777]

in fact, the McLaren drivers are so unprepared for a fast car, they lost a couple of poles and victories, they don't know how to squeeze out the maximum, they have the best car by a couple of tenths, Norris is a good driver for me, but nothing more, Piastre is better, put Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton, Russell and even young Antonella in this car and they could achieve more

[AR3-GP]

They've different styles. It's better to say it suits Lando less.

Piastri is saying "It doesn't suit me anymore than him. I have just adapted better."

I didn't see Piastri say what you quoted. Doesn't sound very Oscar either.

Its written in the quote:

Having discarded the proposed differences between last year's McLaren compared to this year, Piastri highlighted the work his side of the garage and himself have done to put themselves in the position they are in.
"I think we've done a very good job, myself with my engineers on how we deal with that, how I deal with that for my driving, how we deal with that with the setup."
Does it suit him better? The Australian replies: "I think it's a stretch to say it suits me more, because I really don't think there's that much difference [with last year's car], but ultimately the team's going to make the fastest car they can, whatever that looks like and it's kind of up to us to deal with that."
"I think for me it's very similar to last year, some small tweaks but yeah I think it's just been down to hard work why the start of this year has looked a little bit stronger for myself than last year."

[Darth-Piekus]

in fact, the McLaren drivers are so unprepared for a fast car, they lost a couple of poles and victories, they don't know how to squeeze out the maximum, they have the best car by a couple of tenths, Norris is a good driver for me, but nothing more, Piastre is better, put Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton, Russell and even young Antonella in this car and they could achieve more

You are not serious are you. How do you know they would have been able to even drive that Mclaren as good as Lando and Oscar when its a completely different car than the others? Isnt it about time that joke about the dominant Mclaren car to stop?

[BMMR61]

in fact, the McLaren drivers are so unprepared for a fast car, they lost a couple of poles and victories, they don't know how to squeeze out the maximum, they have the best car by a couple of tenths, Norris is a good driver for me, but nothing more, Piastre is better, put Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton, Russell and even young Antonella in this car and they could achieve more

And why not add Sainz, Gasly and Alonso. No, McLaren really do have pretty useless drivers.