[John Galt]

'15-'17 were the Honda years of total write-off.

I think this is the best argument against McLaren. The Honda engine is the best on the grid since teaming up with RB, which squarely places the fault of the broken relationship on McLaren.

 

[New Britain]

All I am saying is that Ric is a good driver. Him and the McLaren just didn’t fit. It happens. Could be a number of reasons, probably most of which we will never know. Ric has won a bunch if races, podiumed a bunch if times, and IMO wasn’t the issue.

Well, the point under discussion was that some clown calling himself 'F1 Memes' took an image of Ricciardo smiling and captioned it, 'When you get paid 18M to not drive McLaren shitbox'.
All I can say is that when Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz, and Oscar Piastri were driving it, it was a lot less of a 'shitbox' than it was when Daniel Ricciardo was driving it.
Funny about that, eh?

 

[New Britain]

I think this is the best argument against McLaren. The Honda engine is the best on the grid since teaming up with RB, which squarely places the fault of the broken relationship on McLaren.

🤔
You are smarter than that, JG!
McLaren-Honda were working in the era of drastically-reduced circuit testing. Because of Red Bull's unique master-slave relationship with Toro Rosso, RB were able to have TR use every practice session, qualifying session, and race as circuit tests to get on top of the numerous problems with the Honda PU. For Red Bull it was a free option. It really would not have been reasonable to expect McLaren, who did not have their own slave team to do all the dirty work for them, to throw away intentionally the 2018 season in the hope that Honda were finally going to get their act together.

 

[invisiblewave]

I think this is the best argument against McLaren. The Honda engine is the best on the grid since teaming up with RB, which squarely places the fault of the broken relationship on McLaren.

Bingo. They spent at least a year blaming the engine when the problem was the rest of the car.

 

[invisiblewave]

🤔
You are smarter than that, JG!
McLaren-Honda were working in the era of drastically-reduced circuit testing. Because of Red Bull's unique master-slave relationship with Toro Rosso, RB were able to have TR use every practice session, qualifying session, and race as circuit tests to get on top of the numerous problems with the Honda PU. For Red Bull it was a free option. It really would not have been reasonable to expect McLaren, who did not have their own slave team to do all the dirty work for them, to throw away intentionally the 2018 season in the hope that Honda were finally going to get their act together.

You have more excuses than a thing with a lot of excuses. Are you really trying to tell us that McLaren are not, and have not been, underperforming, and that the lack of results is solely down to not having the right driver combo?

 

[New Britain]

You have more excuses than a thing with a lot of excuses. Are you really trying to tell us that McLaren are not, and have not been, underperforming, and that the lack of results is solely down to not having the right driver combo?

The point is, under-performing relative to what?

 

[New Britain]

Bingo. They spent at least a year blaming the engine when the problem was the rest of the car.

In 2017, the team's last year with Honda, McLaren had 13 DNFs. How many of those do you suppose were caused by 'the rest of the car' and how many by the PU?

 

[eMcL]

🤔
You are smarter than that, JG!
McLaren-Honda were working in the era of drastically-reduced circuit testing. Because of Red Bull's unique master-slave relationship with Toro Rosso, RB were able to have TR use every practice session, qualifying session, and race as circuit tests to get on top of the numerous problems with the Honda PU. For Red Bull it was a free option. It really would not have been reasonable to expect McLaren, who did not have their own slave team to do all the dirty work for them, to throw away intentionally the 2018 season in the hope that Honda were finally going to get their act together.

Mansour and Bouillier created the toxic environment/relationship with Honda. A team works through difficulties together as a Team. And now Mercedes power, without the MGU-H advantage, is 3rd ranked behind Honda and Ferrari. Difficult to be happy with the results .. 2026 reset?

 

[sailfly]

And the knowledge that, for the previous two seasons, a green kid make him look like an amateur.

I have always enjoyed your postings and its clear you have a lot more knowledge of and experience in this subject than most of this forum. What do you think is the best course of action for Mclaren if they want to get back to their winning ways? In my opinion this is due to Mclaren prioritizing useless commercial endeavors with very little ROI (IndyCar, Extreme E, Formula E), at the expense of spending on the technical leadership and proper infrastructure necessary to win.

"Aston Martin" has the same powertrain, budget cap, and was partly designed in a portable trailer (given the timelines), is in the contention for 2nd or 3rd with one lesser driver precisely because they hired the technical personnel necessary to succeed.

 

[sailfly]

The point is, under-performing relative to what?

Aston.

 

[John Galt]

🤔
You are smarter than that, JG!
McLaren-Honda were working in the era of drastically-reduced circuit testing. Because of Red Bull's unique master-slave relationship with Toro Rosso, RB were able to have TR use every practice session, qualifying session, and race as circuit tests to get on top of the numerous problems with the Honda PU. For Red Bull it was a free option. It really would not have been reasonable to expect McLaren, who did not have their own slave team to do all the dirty work for them, to throw away intentionally the 2018 season in the hope that Honda were finally going to get their act together.

Well, if that is true, all the credit goes to RB for making that happen. McLaren would've been better off doing the same but with their own team instead of a 'slave' outfit. Those years were complete write-offs anyhow. Would have been a fair price to pay for the best engine on the grid BUT my guess is that the McLaren/Honda failure had more to do with McLaren's structure and leadership than it did with Honda not having a slave team for testing.

 

[New Britain]

I have always enjoyed your postings and its clear you have a lot more knowledge of and experience in this subject than most of this forum. What do you think is the best course of action for Mclaren if they want to get back to their winning ways? In my opinion this is due to Mclaren prioritizing useless commercial endeavors with very little ROI (IndyCar, Extreme E, Formula E), at the expense of spending on the technical leadership and proper infrastructure necessary to win.

"Aston Martin" has the same powertrain, budget cap, and was partly designed in a portable trailer (given the timelines), is in the contention for 2nd or 3rd with one lesser driver precisely because they hired the technical personnel necessary to succeed.

Thanks.
The thing is, although I suspect I do know more about F1 or motor racing than the majority here do (just as they know incomparably more than I do about countless other subjects), relative to the insiders at an F1 team I know next-to-nothing. For that reason it seems crazy for me to say that McLaren, for example, should be doing this or that differently. The operating people at every team are very smart and exceptionally hard working. Some of the team owners might be jerks, but that is a different story. As it happened, at the time I thought that McLaren should not cancel the Honda deal, but even if in retrospect I was 'right', it was only an uninformed guess based mostly on hunches and thin air.

What gets under my skin is this notion that McLaren 'should be' doing better. Any team that fails to win that year's championship 'should be' doing better.
Why have Red Bull done well? Maybe they have a great culture and an organisation filled with the most talented people. Maybe they are really smarter than everyone else.
There may be an element of truth in that, but we also know that on technical matters ever since 2010 they have been cheating and the FIA let them get away with it; they have the (probably) most talented driver but also the dirtiest driver and here again the FIA let them get away with it. They did not really win any title in 2021, although the record books fictitiously suggest that they won WDC. They have had the huge advantage of a second team that can be used to test out anything that they want, flouting the limits on wind tunnel and computational time. And even with all those advantages they could not help themselves, they just had to go ahead and be the only team that cheated on the 2021 cost cap, for which they were barely penalised. So, yes, Red Bull have been doing better than McLaren, but I don't see that comparison as evidence of a failure by McLaren. Merc and Fezza each spent at least a billion dollars more than McLaren in the time leading up to the cost cap, and some of the knowledge generated by that expense will still be valuable today. Not forever, but for a while more.

I don't think any of us will be in a position to opine on how well McLaren are doing until their new wind tunnel and simulator have had their effect, so next year. As to strategic dilution by participating in other formulae, my impression is that the brain drain from the F1 team has been minimal. The cost cap forced McLaren (and several other teams) to reassign some of their engineering staff, so (to generalise) those people would have been gone anyhow.
I was very disappointed that Seidl left, but McLaren knew several months in advance that he might ask to break his contract. They let him go when they did not have to do that and, despite the lead time, instead of looking outside they slotted Stella straight into the job, so either they are complete idiots, which they are not, or Stella is probably going to be a capable TP.

This stuff takes a long time to change, but it does change, and it helps us fans if we are patient.

 

[New Britain]

Aston.

I wonder how much of this year's Aston is really last year's Red Bull, seeing as how last year Dan Fallows came from Red Bull to become Aston's technical director. Red Bull have already commented on what one might call remarkable similarities.

We know how much Fatboy Stroll likes to copy other team's designs (remember the 'Pink Mercedes'?), and we also know that Fallows has the ethics of a snake.
A few years ago Fallows was already a very senior aerodynamicist at Red Bull and McLaren hired him. His contract with Red Bull had expired, he signed a new binding contract with McLaren - it was all above board.
Fallows did his garden leave and was due to report for his first day at McLaren on 'X' date. He didn't show up, nor did he show up for the rest of what should have been his first week. Supposedly he was not responding to McLaren's attempts to reach him, although in retrospect he was obviously still communicating with Red Bull, because after a week of being a no-show, he informed McLaren that, despite his contract, he had decided he would be going back to Red Bull. This was straight out of the Christian Horner book of 'How to Make Money Whilst Lacking a Shred of Integrity'. It may be required reading for all Red Bull employees.

 

[invisiblewave]

Thanks.
The thing is, although I suspect I do know more about F1 or motor racing than the majority here do (just as they know incomparably more than I do about countless other subjects), relative to the insiders at an F1 team I know next-to-nothing. For that reason it seems crazy for me to say that McLaren, for example, should be doing this or that differently. The operating people at every team are very smart and exceptionally hard working. Some of the team owners might be jerks, but that is a different story. As it happened, at the time I thought that McLaren should not cancel the Honda deal, but even if in retrospect I was 'right', it was only an uninformed guess based mostly on hunches and thin air.

What gets under my skin is this notion that McLaren 'should be' doing better. Any team that fails to win that year's championship 'should be' doing better.
Why have Red Bull done well? Maybe they have a great culture and an organisation filled with the most talented people. Maybe they are really smarter than everyone else.
There may be an element of truth in that, but we also know that on technical matters ever since 2010 they have been cheating and the FIA let them get away with it; they have the (probably) most talented driver but also the dirtiest driver and here again the FIA let them get away with it. They did not really win any title in 2021, although the record books fictitiously suggest that they won WDC. They have had the huge advantage of a second team that can be used to test out anything that they want, flouting the limits on wind tunnel and computational time. And even with all those advantages they could not help themselves, they just had to go ahead and be the only team that cheated on the 2021 cost cap, for which they were barely penalised. So, yes, Red Bull have been doing better than McLaren, but I don't see that comparison as evidence of a failure by McLaren. Merc and Fezza each spent at least a billion dollars more than McLaren in the time leading up to the cost cap, and some of the knowledge generated by that expense will still be valuable today. Not forever, but for a while more.

I don't think any of us will be in a position to opine on how well McLaren are doing until their new wind tunnel and simulator have had their effect, so next year. As to strategic dilution by participating in other formulae, my impression is that the brain drain from the F1 team has been minimal. The cost cap forced McLaren (and several other teams) to reassign some of their engineering staff, so (to generalise) those people would have been gone anyhow.
I was very disappointed that Seidl left, but McLaren knew several months in advance that he might ask to break his contract. They let him go when they did not have to do that and, despite the lead time, instead of looking outside they slotted Stella straight into the job, so either they are complete idiots, which they are not, or Stella is probably going to be a capable TP.

This stuff takes a long time to change, but it does change, and it helps us fans if we are patient.

So, to summarize, we should shut up and stop speculating because we don't have perfect knowledge of the situation. 😂. This is sport, not global number strategy!

 

[New Britain]

Well, if that is true, all the credit goes to RB for making that happen. McLaren would've been better off doing the same but with their own team instead of a 'slave' outfit. Those years were complete write-offs anyhow. Would have been a fair price to pay for the best engine on the grid BUT my guess is that the McLaren/Honda failure had more to do with McLaren's structure and leadership than it did with Honda not having a slave team for testing.

Maybe, but that acquisition happened in 2005, and it should never have been allowed in the first place. Other sports - the ones with some integrity and self-respect - forbid more than one team being owned by the same controlling party, because of the painfully obvious conflict of interest. Then again, those were the days when chief regulator Max Mosley was focused on helping Bernie and himself make more money, undermining Ron Dennis and Frank Williams, and getting flogged by women wearing Luftwaffe uniforms and barking at him in German.

 

[New Britain]

So, to summarize, we should shut up and stop speculating because we don't have perfect knowledge of the situation. 😂. This is sport, not global number strategy!

Nothing wrong with speculating, but, on the basis of woefully inadequate knowledge, incessantly criticising people who are doing something far, far better than one could do it oneself is weak and unattractive. That is not 'speculating', that is just complaining.

 

[invisiblewave]

Nothing wrong with speculating, but, on the basis of woefully inadequate knowledge, incessantly criticising people who are doing something far, far better than one could do it oneself is weak and unattractive. That is not 'speculating', that is just complaining.

Now you're getting it! If they can't stand the heat....

 

[Anthony D]

Well, the point under discussion was that some clown calling himself 'F1 Memes' took an image of Ricciardo smiling and captioned it, 'When you get paid 18M to not drive McLaren shitbox'.
All I can say is that when Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz, and Oscar Piastri were driving it, it was a lot less of a 'shitbox' than it was when Daniel Ricciardo was driving it.
Funny about that, eh?

Yeah, I saw that meme, was pretty funny IMO. While I haven’t poured over the data, It is possible the car just wasn’t a good fit for him. I’m not sure how much racing experience you have, but if you do have any, you know that sometimes you get in a car (or a bike in my case), and it just doesn’t suit you, you can’t go fast in it no matter what, and eventually you just cut your losses. Like I said, it happens, and it doesn’t make Ric a bad driver.

 

[New Britain]

Yeah, I saw that meme, was pretty funny IMO. While I haven’t poured over the data, It is possible the car just wasn’t a good fit for him. I’m not sure how much racing experience you have, but if you do have any, you know that sometimes you get in a car (or a bike in my case), and it just doesn’t suit you, you can’t go fast in it no matter what, and eventually you just cut your losses. Like I said, it happens, and it doesn’t make Ric a bad driver.

As it happens, I have done enough racing to have had the experience of going from the previous generation of my racing car to (what was) the current one. I preferred the older one, said that to the senior engineer, and he told me, 'Trust me. Give the car a chance, get used to it - it is faster.' I continued to feel more comfortable in the older one, but sure enough the newer one was definitely faster and I made the change to new, and never wanted to go back.

Nobody is saying that Ricciardo is a bad driver, but it is a fact that, relative to 'the standard' (in Mike Tomlin's language), when Ricciardo was at McLaren he drove badly. Carlos and Lando both said that the McLarens were tricky to drive (I think I saw a similar comment from Oscar recently), but they adapted.
If Carlos and Lando and Oscar could adapt, but Ricciardo could not adapt, was that the car's fault? McLaren produced a car that was fast enough to do Lando's lap-times (if not theoretically even faster ones). I don't see how Ricciardo's inability to adapt is anyone's responsibility but his own.

I am not going to go searching for the exact quote, but at some point about a year ago Ricciardo told a journalist that he didn't really 'do engineering'. Unlike a Schumacher (Sr), Rosberg (Jr), or maybe Hamilton, he was not inclined to pore over telemetry or try to get his head around mass dampers or pull-rod suspensions. He was more of a seat-of-the-pants guy. That did not say a lot for his commitment to up his game. If he had been more open to learning about the engineering side, might that have helped him to master the McLarens? We'll never now, but he ought at least to have tried.

 

[Anthony D]

As it happens, I have done enough racing to have had the experience of going from the previous generation of my racing car to (what was) the current one. I preferred the older one, said that to the senior engineer, and he told me, 'Trust me. Give the car a chance, get used to it - it is faster.' I continued to feel more comfortable in the older one, but sure enough the newer one was definitely faster and I made the change to new, and never wanted to go back.

Nobody is saying that Ricciardo is a bad driver, but it is a fact that, relative to 'the standard' (in Mike Tomlin's language), when Ricciardo was at McLaren he drove badly. Carlos and Lando both said that the McLarens were tricky to drive (I think I saw a similar comment from Oscar recently), but they adapted.
If Carlos and Lando and Oscar could adapt, but Ricciardo could not adapt, was that the car's fault? McLaren produced a car that was fast enough to do Lando's lap-times (if not theoretically even faster ones). I don't see how Ricciardo's inability to adapt is anyone's responsibility but his own.

I am not going to go searching for the exact quote, but at some point about a year ago Ricciardo told a journalist that he didn't really 'do engineering'. Unlike a Schumacher (Sr), Rosberg (Jr), or maybe Hamilton, he was not inclined to pore over telemetry or try to get his head around mass dampers or pull-rod suspensions. He was more of a seat-of-the-pants guy. That did not say a lot for his commitment to up his game. If he had been more open to learning about the engineering side, might that have helped him to master the McLarens? We'll never now, but he ought at least to have tried.

Makes a lot of sense, I didn’t know he was so reluctant to help with the development/engineering aspect.