McLaren has improved astonishingly in F1 in 2023, transforming itself from back-of-the-grid struggler to podium regular.
To have any chance of becoming a Red Bull beater next year and beyond, McLaren must hit what Lando Norris calls its next development target. But doing that will be easier said than done given it requires McLaren to get on top of a persistent problem going back years.
So what is the problem? Well, the short version is that the McLarens have been tricky to drive and inconsistent throughout Norris’s five seasons with the team. He’s not the only one who has said that, with team-mate Oscar Piastri in complete agreement.
And former McLaren racers Carlos Sainz and Daniel Ricciardo felt the same way, with Ricciardo struggling so much it almost ended his F1 career.
Norris characterises the McLaren as being on a knife-edge.
If you can dance on that knife-edge, the car is fast, but slip off it and it can make life very difficult. So whereas Max Verstappen appears to be able to use the Red Bull RB19 to bend the laws of physics to his command, Norris and Piastri are far less comfortable in the McLaren.
That’s why, while McLaren is still chasing more downforce - because downforce is still the primary performance driver in F1 - the next target is to make the car easier to drive.
00:00 Knife-edge McLarens
01:31 Persistent problem
03:31 The cause
05:15 Juggling act
07:34 Will fixing it be enough?
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