More details about McLaren's technical leadership changes are becoming public as it has now become clear that Toro Rosso's highly valued technical director, James Key, is set to join McLaren in the same role.
This forum contains threads to discuss teams themselves. Anything not technical about the cars, including restructuring, performances etc belongs here.
The article speculates of Force India/Mercedes hybrid nose design.
Anyone got an opinion on that?
I certainly hope not, one car with those nostrils is already ugly enough. It could be a blend between a Mercedes nose with their own slotted pillars, or a hybrid between their current nose with Mercedes' cape. Introducing a cape seems large enough that it could delay an entire aero package.
Q: (Stefano Mancini – La Stampa) Kimi, will you help Vettel to win his championship this year?
Kimi Raikkonen: I can only drive one car, obviously.
@2018 Singapore Grand Prix drivers press conference.
How many race weekends do we think before they are able to use this design optimally? This was meant to be on the car in Melbourne, so they are already 4 races behind. Maybe not until Austria before they can start extracting peak performance from it?
It seems Red Bull have a significant upgrade package, as well. So it will be interesting to see if Mclaren can make any net gains on them, but I think the focus would be trying to jump the midfield. That in itself won't be easy.
Q: (Stefano Mancini – La Stampa) Kimi, will you help Vettel to win his championship this year?
Kimi Raikkonen: I can only drive one car, obviously.
@2018 Singapore Grand Prix drivers press conference.
They will get more familiair with and optimise the setup during next weeks test. But hopefully they can already extract most out of it this weekend.. even more important: hopefully it works as expected. Props anyway to McLaren for being innovative, finding the boundaries and being brave. I have given them a lot of flak for this season’s performance so far. But they deserve credit for coming up with such a huge unconservative update. Regardless of the performance. This is why I am fan of this team. And this is what I’ve missed of them from several years.
They will get more familiair with and optimise the setup during next weeks test. But hopefully they can already extract most out of it this weekend.. even more important: hopefully it works as expected. Props anyway to McLaren for being innovative, finding the boundaries and being brave. I have given them a lot of flak for this season’s performance so far. But they deserve credit for coming up with such a huge unconservative update. Regardless of the performance. This is why I am fan of this team. And this is what I’ve missed of them from several years.
I agree with you on that, the end product of the much awaited upgrade package gives the indication of a team pushing to get back to winning ways. From various comments, it appears the jury is still out on the looks, but it's certainly not underwhelming. Let's hope the delay was worth it, and Mclaren will be part of conversations for the right reasons.
Q: (Stefano Mancini – La Stampa) Kimi, will you help Vettel to win his championship this year?
Kimi Raikkonen: I can only drive one car, obviously.
@2018 Singapore Grand Prix drivers press conference.
How many race weekends do we think before they are able to use this design optimally? This was meant to be on the car in Melbourne, so they are already 4 races behind. Maybe not until Austria before they can start extracting peak performance from it?
It has to be this weekend. McLaren is just trying to downplay the upgrade, but it's clearly huge. They are aiming for huge gains with this b-spec, not just a couple of tenths.