McLaren can be considered quite satisfied with the start of the season 2024, with two podiums and a sprint pole position in the first 5 races of the season. On the other hand, the objective for the team Of Woking was to maintain the trend relating to the development trajectory undertaken last season which had literally turned the results of the previous campaign around, giving the papaya colored team the chance to fight for podiums and sometimes compete for Red Bull victories.
During the last world championship event, Grand Prix from the China to ShanghaiThe team captained by the Italian Andrea Stella managed to establish itself as the second force on the track, making perfect use of the car’s package to finish with Lando Norris ahead of Ferraribehind the alone and unattainable RB20 Of Max Verstappen. The happiness for the result achieved is even greater because McLaren had previously put their “hands out” for the eastern stage, considering the track certainly not fertile ground for their car.
The craving for improvement was in fact postponed You love me And Imola, where important updates are planned to contain the shortcomings of the black-orange single-seater and at the same time enhance its current strengths. Ironically, the same Norris he had bet to finish the GP a good 35 seconds behind the reds, only to end up on the second step of the podium and in fact in front of the two SF-24. So let’s see what the areas are McLaren must intervene by predicting which components will be affected by the developments.
F1, McLaren to increase mechanical grip and reduce drag
Let’s start by understanding what the company’s strong points are MCL38. Without a doubt among these we find great skills in fast corners, especially those where a single is required input of steering wheel. The most striking examples are the first sectors of Jeddah And SuzukaWhere Platesbut most of all Landau they managed to score partials recordsometimes even better than those of Red Bull. Furthermore there McLaren It doesn’t seem to have any particular problems getting the covers up to temperature.
This is the case of the qualification of sprint to ShanghaiWhere Norris he gave the second place 1.3s Lewis Hamilton thanks to the sole advantage of having the tires return to the correct “working window”, one lap before everyone else. On the other hand, the English single-seater seems to suffer in long leaning corners, where the driver must maintain a high steering angle for longer. Even slow folds create headaches, a symbol of the fact that the grip mechanic needs to improve. However, the real worry is the so-called EOSS (End Of Straight Speed), i.e. the maximum speed reached at the end of the straights. If we think back to the Saudi race, in fact, Plates he spent almost half stint to try to overtake Hamilton.
The Australian was unable to pass as, even a DRS open, the car crashed at very low speeds. This maximum speed problem is further accentuated on low-load circuits, a sign that aerodynamic efficiency is lacking. So what to expect for the next appointments? Surely you will prefer the search for grip, especially at low speeds and in tight bends, which generally results in a revisiting of the suspension pattern. The lower the speeds, the lower the load produced and consequently the car relies more on the suspension to ensure the maximum possible grip.
It is therefore reasonable to expect some innovations in the area of the suspension front end. As regards straight-line efficiency, this is the aspect on which it is most difficult to work: removing aerodynamic resistance without affecting the load levels produced, in fact, is a truly arduous task which generally concerns the components least exposed to the direct impact of the ‘air. It will therefore be interesting to place the magnifying glass in the areas of the bottom and under the car, rather than near the spoilers or the car body.
To symbolize how challenging it actually is to work on efficiency, it is precisely the fact that this problem is shared among the current ones MCL38 and its progenitor la MCL60. In short, grip mechanical and efficiency, these are the key points they will work on in Woking. The most attentive will know that the American appointment of You love me will present the format again sprint, reducing the minutes available to work on the cars and validate the updates to just 60. About that Andrea Stella confirmed an undoubtedly interesting factor.
Bringing an evolutionary package means being convinced that it works even in the presence of sprint race and reduced free practice. The main problem remains making ends meet with the limits of the budget cap: “The main challenge is: bring the updates to sprint races or not? […] Because you only have one free practice session. But then there is another challenge, which is the budget limit. You can’t make it happen as soon as you have something reasonable to produce, because you risk running out of budget. So you have to be convinced that this will be a good update. Then you press the green button and spend the money.”
The Grand Prix Of You love me looks very interesting McLaren And Mercedes will bring some innovations to the track, although with very different objectives: on the one hand there is the intention of turning the season around as in the case of Mercedesvictim of herself with a W15 who just can’t express himself at his best. While on the other we find the British team that intends to surpass the performance of Ferrariseeking to provide some continuity to the company’s recent encouraging performances MCL38. We just have to wait a little more than a week to appreciate the news.
Author: Andrea Mauri – howf1works
Images: McLaren F1 Team
