So in other words, if you put the strengths of the Mercedes together with those of the McLaren then you have a competitive race car

its been 12 years and McLaren still needs more time. Its becoming increasingly annoying now considering the fact that they were tipped to be consistent podium finishers this year.

Wtf is that straight line speed by hass💀

Everyone loves how honest Stella is but nobody tends to actually listen. He said this months ago. 2024 was for consistent podiums, 2025 is for wins & therefore championships.

Apparently this video was about McLaren. All we saw was that haas graph

1:19 I see Haas once again using the 2019 Ferrari power unit

Stella ia doing a top job. People seem to forget that they had been reading the aero data wrong and when they realised that they knew their game plan. It takes time to get to the top. It didn't happen at RB overnight.

McLaren seems to always be "1 year out" to compete at the very front... Same story, new year...

Let's hope McLaren step up like last year along with Ferrari and Aston plus Merc. Give the front a bit of spice! Seeing Max driving at this level so consistently is amazing and impressive to witness, but a bit of jeopardy wouldn't go amiss!

06:25 Suzuka is a front-limited circuit: to reach the best laptime the limitation is the front axle/grip/downforce/driving style. Hence the name: front-limited.

Don't sleep on Aston Martin. They have been cooking hard. Just wait....

Thank you. As a McLaren fan, I am desperate for videos like this that clearly explains what is going on. At least we are moving to the sharp end of the pack.

With Ferrari making the waves they have, I can’t see McLaren getting as many podiums as 2023, however I’ve still got hope for Suzuka, Silverstone and Qatar.

Lol all off season British press and social media was certain McLaren would be Red Bulls main challenger

this sort of content is a delight, I hope you never have to stop doing this guys... thank you so much for making this possible

Great video, you did a greag job breaking down the data and explaining it. Its nice to see a real F1 bideo based on facts and not just click bait.

Is that the F1 game you show at 3:40? 😂 anyway, nice Video again, love your work

I'm no expert but I would think problems in slow corners are due to mechanical grip, not aero. Or maybe the aero problem is also the reason why the car is so sensitive to wind changes. Would that make sense?

The McLaren 720S GT3 evo and MCL 38 seem to have similar problems with the long slow speed stuff.

The wind tunnel, major facility upgrades, and organizational restructuring are finished. 2024 will need consistent progress and 2025 is put up or shut up. Fingers crossed

And a month ago they’re “giving RB a run for their money”.

It's frustrating that we haven't built upon the promise so far, hopefully in true mclaren style we hit the ground running as the season progresses

Can you do a “change in team management”

With all of these teams changing their design philosophies I've always felt that 2024 would be the base from which many teams will built much more competitive cars in 2025

0:50 Imagine blaming the slow turns for losing time in sectors 2 & 3 when they had like the slowest straight line speed on the grid--almost like that same downforce level is why they were the fastest in sector 1.

You guys were looking good on netflix, touched by how you were with Ottmar, he didn’t desserve that

Despite sidepod differences and talks of revolutionary designs, all 2024 cars are an evolution of their 2023 brothers. The stability of the regulations makes it impossible for a team to produce a completely different concept (aero+kinematics) without taking a huge step backwards. Yes, Mercedes changed a lot in its car, the position of the SIPs, the suspension outer elements, the sidepods, the engine cover, but even they were bound to end up with similar kinematic characteristics. A lot of this regulation era depends on good, old suspension kinematics. The suspension has to provide the usual mechanical grip while keeping the platform stable and balanced through a relatively large ride height range. McLaren has produced a concept which is absolutely mighty within a very small ride height range. As soon as the lack of aero load raises the car, the floor loses a massive chunk of its downforce. As a result, they have to put as much wing on as they can get away with for the low speed without sacrificing too much straight line speed. Now, is that an aero problem, a suspension problem or both? It's most likely both, though the suspension is probably the biggest contributor. Does the team completely understand the problem? Probably not, otherwise they would've solved it by now. Can they solve it? Of course! They just have to find out which magic sauce RedBull are using in their suspension. Aggressive anti-dive and anti-squat seems to be one of the magical ingredients, though most teams seem afraid or unsure about getting it work. Mercedes is now running adjustable front top wishbones (at a significant weight penalty) because, I presume, they did not have the confidence or perhaps understanding to go with the most aggressive setup for every single race.

I'm fearing if papa Alonso retires next season 😢😢

With a potential minor upgrade for Miami, are the teams now allowed to use the sprint for testing new parts or are they still required to keep the car the same for both the sprint and the GP?

so many one year plans!

The top speed is a bit of odd measures, as this video points out. The Speed Trap timings being in a DRS zone mostly measures DRS efficiency. In Spa & Monza last year when the McLaren had upgraded overall, its rear wing upgrades for those tracks were disappointing in effect, with it being almost having GP2 straight struggles at Spa until the track surface became damp and suddenly it was the fastest car on track. The need something more or they won’t be able to overtake into the critical corner breaking zones in Melbourne. Now Australia is a much faster lap than it was after the middle sector became straighter, but it has to be concerning how much parts of Saudi’s track superficially resemble the best & worst bits of Suzuka for McLaren. I can see the McLaren, once it’s lumbered through T1, walking away from most cars in the Esesses and Degnas before battling with the Hairpin & Spoon corners and being compromised onto the back straight until 130R, where it could be the fastest or not. Will that be enough or will the McLarens not be able to get further forward than 5th & 6th at either track?

As a customer team they are still limited to some degree The are back to were in 2021

Fan since 02 and being fan of this team is so hard, really exhausted...

So McLaren, that haven’t been able to get their cars ‘right’ for the past two (+?) sets of design rules, is certain that they’ll get it right ‘this time.’ PS. 0:25 Using two indistinguishable shades of orange for a comparaison is useless.

I seem to heard this before

It’s clear that other teams just dropped the ball when it comes to car development.

Seeing the old McLaren really shows how high off the ground the old cars were run compared to the current ones

Bwahaha. Love it. You said the same thing 2 years ago!

How on Earth can they be so slow on the straights and still have awful DRS efficiency?

Skating on a “knife edge” in your bare feet, that be a McLaren…I wonder how Lando and Oscar would fare in an RB20s!

Yikes. Scheduled to solve the problem in the last year of the regs. Hopefully the new regs won't set them back to square one. Again. Hope NOR gets the car his apparent talent deserves.

In the meantime, Red Bull has shifted 100% of its resources to developing 2025 car...

"At least another year'!?!??!? Whatttttttt😢😢😢

I can't understand why the team didn't listen to Norris and make more effort to eliminate that low-speed, knife-edge feeling in the car. He's had those complaints for a long time but the basic characteristics are the same. I hope the new structure and in-house wind tunnel can change that during the season. It feels like since the turn of the century, McLaren have been suffering with swinging from one major weakness to another; whether it's reliability, poor aero baseline or (like Williams) failing to adapt to modern techniques.

Funny that all the front teams are apparently having such major issues with their cars that they still manage to win races with the mid and backfield cars always behind. Now that said how does that represent those teams, are they doing an even worse job???

Nearly 30 years since McLaren won the constructors championship. 😢😢

McLaren used to be run by Ron Dennis. Dennis hired Alonso at 35 millions per season & brought in Honda. Unfortunately for this gamble, the japanese were not up to the challenge... "GP2 engine ...in suzuka" McLaren collapsed because of Honda. Ron Dennis sold his 25% , he was pushed out by Mansour Ojjeh. They went for Renault. Then they were back to square 1 with Mercedes. Then Ojjeh dies.

Haas using the Manor strategy I see.

This will be the case for so long as F1 forbids meaningful innovation and upgrades during the season. For several years now, the opening rounds have flawlessly predicted the season outcomes. (Yawn.) There is no reason to get upset about it. It's just F1 in the post-turbo era.

Poor sod who has to spin those wind tunnel blades..! ;-)

And McLaren now his a HIGH FORMER RBR ENGINEER in their ranks…the big guy, who was at the podium with Max in Australia last season, I forgot his name, Head Technical Departments or something… So it’s not that they don’t have in house… they bought some…

Sounds like a 2023 video

emphatic

McLaren needs to be vary to the fact that there main challenge is Mercedes who having the 5th fastest car and still able to somehow compete against McLaren especially considering Mercedes probably have the most amount of potential to be unlocked by aero upgrades to the car.

It would be interesting to see Norris in a Red Bull tuned to his driving style, as it is tuned to Verstappen now. I have a nagging suspicion that McLaren is really holding Norris back, and if he was given a truly competitive car he would be most impressive.

Why does every car other than Redbull have such big weaknesses. Red bull can comfortably win at every track but the others are only competitive at specific tracks. Sometimes its McLaren, sometimes Ferrari, sometimes Aston Martin and Mercedes. Why can Red bull have it all but the others stuck with big strengths and big weaknesses.

I don't understand why people overestimate Mclaren so much. Last time they fought for a title was 12 years ago and if you exclude the super lucky 2021 Monza race, they haven't won a single race in 12 years. They are decent but they don't have what it takes to bring the fight to the top teams.

Cost cap is now hurting the competitive nature of the sport at the front of the pack.

Step 1 steal one of the RBs Step 2 repaint it Step 3 fight for podiums and wins.😂

nobody can build a good car except one team, that's a problem

Should “playing catch up for the last decade” not be a null point due to the 2022 technical regulation changes?

Every team should just forget it

So do you think they will genuinely challenge red bull next year or no

It's kind of annoying but not surprising that we're talking about the same exact issues once again and that it's going to be yet another year or two .... I'm not holding my breath for that

4:08 - RedBull are winning because they have two employees turning their wind tunnel fan..

0:45 Alpine 😂

They (Mcl) just looking for 3rd place in 2024 not chasing RB or Ferrari. They focusing on 2026 championship

Baby steps. They're still re-learning how to drive without that obnoxious blue on their livery.

Why dont you get more cost budget the further down the order you are at the end of a seasson?

Emphatically.

Ricciardo said the car had problems and for his efforts he was shown the door. Then Lando said the car had basicaly the same problems that Daniel said it had. However Lando was able to adapt to the flaws in the car better than Daniel. Two years on and the car still has problems that seem to be "baked" into the way McLaren make their car. Haven't they learnt that if you what you have done in the past doensl't work, then baning your head against the same brick wall will only achieve the same result. Time to either throw out the reciepe and bake a better car or through out the chef and see if a new one can bake a better car. They have in Lanod and Oscar two great capiable drivers who can score regular points if the car was up to it. Clearly it's not All the new infrusture I think is online and was used to build this year's car, but it still hasn't helped. So maybe, it's time to look at other "excuses" for the failures.

Haas needs a straight Circuit

I think McLaren is rather circuit dependent; a car that performs far better on some tracks and far worse on others. At the very end of the last season Ferrari was topping McLaren again. Also, I don't find Norris that convincing (not bad at any rate, just not outstanding) and I was hoping Piastri would have stepped passed him by now.

Its always 1 more year

Ceiling of a non-works team has been hit.

I dont get why its being made out to be a disappointing start to the year when mclaren are 3rd atm. Last year it was 4th, before 5th, before that 4th again and the 3rd which was their best in a long long time. Theyre still tracking upwards it seems, so relax f1tv. In their eyes every car is made out to be “uncompetitive”. Well yes, everything is compared to an RB but there are 10 cars in this not just 2.

To much down force on rear wing

Everyone is treating this season as a holdover season.

So mclaren again is catching up and is a year behind, great.

But what if, hear me out, what if they will apply budget and wind tunnel restrictions based on the points difference in the construction championship not just on the place in it. It is good to give “bad” teams more opportunities, but fans more fighting on top of

McLaren talked a bigger game than this over the winter

What the fuck are haas doing to get that top speed. When I think top speed, I either think Ferrari (where RB and Merc were better in corners, think 2018-2021) or I surprisingly think Williams, who put alot of effort into straight line speed a couple of years to do well at a few tracks only.

There's no way they'll be fighting for wins until the rules change again. Ferrari, Mercedes and McLaren will have to fight among themselves for 2nd while Verstappen wins everything.

just busy watching the best drivers in the world ...WRC

RBR not any fastest sector in the saudi race? weird!

Meanwhile other teams bring more innovations… Mclaren not being able to catch on development. So, they dont have a year to solve it… they have 1 year to make a quantum leap.

At least they have a better package than Mercedes lol

seems like mclaren did just fine today. I dont understand whats happening in these comments. everyones making fun of mclaren for always being 1 year away. i havent watched f1 in years, last time i did mclaren was an actual joke. today i saw them finish 2nd and 3rd with 2 promising young drivers and a car that looks close to being the fastest on the grid, so what exactly are they doing wrong? red bull are currently the most dominant team in the history of the sport and people think mclaren is going to just casually pass them up overnight?

Game footage ? ...really ?

It’s disappointing they have one the most potential drivers of the field, too bad the car is so terrible 😢

McLaren should've start addressing these issues in 2021. You know, when Ricciardo, their only race winner since Lewis left, told them this was the major issue with the car and told them they needed to fix it. Instead, they fired him, only for Norris to start saying the exact same thing at the start of the next season, and now they're 2 or 3 years further behind then they could be. McLaren is an atrocious team.

The dilemma of F1 is that if your car needs development, then while you're fixing that, everyone else is making similar progress on theirs. So catching up requires a monumental effort - which is no longer allowed by F1's budget rules. The only way F1 encourages competition is by tearing up the rulebook every 5 years, and making everyone start over.

Different year same excuse

Excuses again, Mclaren get the easiest ride from the media for the perfomance of their cars. The Mclaren "What ever it takes" slogan seems to be a 'long time' as the answer. Hyped to Red Bull challengers to fall behind a rebuilding Ferrari

Just copy RB. It worked last year.

McLaren will never be a title winning force whilst Zak Brown is in charge.

My VW up has a better top speed than that Mcpain

New year same old excuses, wind tunnel, technical staff, more time needed. Proper change is changing what is at the top, Andreas Stella seems far more responsible and trustworthy being the CEO of Mclaren & team principle than Zak Brown being the CEO and holding it back. I feel bad for both drivers, had so much promise last season only to be disappointed this season, again same old excuses Mclaren has been needing time to be competitive for 12 years afterall

This is why NO ONE IS CATCHING RED BULL. Enjoy guys cos this is prob the closest everyone will be to red bull 😢 F1 needs to drop that cost cap, for top teams to close up.

McLaren, Mercedes, Ferrari. None of them are coming back, Red Bull will win forever and ever. Red Bull will continue to win until F1 comes to an end either because WWIII is fully deployed or bc our AI overlord will find car racing too vulgar and ban it.