2025 McLaren F1 Team

[Ben1980]

its a bit poo, but i wasnt expecting a mclaren top 3 here anyways. Max was always favourite, that red bull is quick on these tracks

I think 2nd and 3rd was achievable. Landos first lap was looking good.

[matt_b]

Not able to tune into qualy.

Poor from lando it seems. Piastri will start from the back wont he? If so lando needed pole position to get that big point differential but once again lando fails to execute!

Why will he start from the back? they can repair the car like for like without incurring a penalty, as things stand he starts P9 and Lando P7 before the Stewards go through all the infringements of various drivers.

[mwillems]

its a bit poo, but i wasnt expecting a mclaren top 3 here anyways. Max was always favourite, that red bull is quick on these tracks

I felt we had every chance at pole.

Perhaps this car is very wind sensitive but im not sure why they've struggled here so much, but then I haven't been able to watch any of qualy so far.

[FittingMechanics]

This sucks. At least we'll get some overtaking (hopefully) and on track action between championship contenders.

I think whoever was first out would struggle, Max risked it with the red/yellow and benefited.

[BMMR61]

It has looked like the McLaren has been a bit sketchy for setup here, like driving on a knife edge. Unusual for Oscar to make that kind of mistake. Lando had a serious brush on his last attempt and was lucky not to bin it. What a marathon session!

[Ben1980]

Was everyone on new tyres, apart from Lando?

[Emag]

Yeah wheelspinning out of every traction zone after the first corner is pretty damn obvious I guess. He lost ~0.5s by hitting the wall. Wouldn't have been P2, but might have clinged onto P3 without the mistake.

[De Wet]

That Did Not End Well...

[Slahinki]

Bold of Piastri to try and take that corner seemingly without slowing down. Ruined his own quali and that of Norris.

[venkyhere]

Seems like the old enemy is back eh?
Or maybe they had never left..

2 consecutive races where Mclaren have not had the fastest car..

Enough of this nonsense excuse please. Don't blame the car.
When conditions got greasy, both drivers failed to adjust to the reduced grip and drive accordingly, both of them went for 'as late as possible' braking into T15 (they lost time even before reaching here, so it wasn't as if they were flawless until this point) when clearly people were crashing in T15 all the time. They should try a better technique to warm up the tyres on the outlap or make changes to their inputs by adapting to the changing grip.

I saw only one guy doing this and bettering his Q2 (dry grip) time in a greasy Q3 - their nemesis.
(Sainz bettered his Q2 time in his Q3 first run when track was dry, so that doesn't count)

Given the fact that they had used softs (Max had new), P2 and P3 was in the bag, and both of them binned it.

[WardenOfTheNorth]

I swear on the Sky coverage they said that Lando still had new softs available. Even if we assume the used softs had perhaps only been used on one of the many aborted runs, why not use them if he had?

Also sending him out first robbed him of a tow, which they reckoned was worth around 0.25 seconds.

Not to excuse his overdriving, but why throw away free laptime?

Race tomorrow should be interesting. How quickly can they clear the Mercs, RB and Williams?

[Ben1980]

I swear on the Sky coverage they said that Lando still had new softs available. Even if we assume the used softs had perhaps only been used on one of the many aborted runs, why not use them if he had?

Also sending him out first robbed him of a tow, which they reckoned was worth around 0.25 seconds.

Not to excuse his overdriving, but why throw away free laptime?

Race tomorrow should be interesting. How quickly can they clear the Mercs, RB and Williams?

If he had new softs id expect him to use them. Max did the red flag run on mediums, which is why he had the new soft. Maybe Lando had new medium but didn't fancy them.

Im guessing first because people where binning it left and centre and wanted to get something on board.

[CjC]

Stella is often right but I hope he’s wrong about any Verstappen resurgence:

https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/why- ... -comeback/

[Emag]

They would be foolish to ignore it. The Monza upgrade was clearly a big step up. Max didn’t just win the race, he was significantly faster than the nearest followers. I kind of expected the same to happen in Baku but with McLaren being closer.

The real test will be Singapore though. If Max eats them up there then yeah, they will be at a risk of losin the wdc to him.