Stella says Barcelona confirmed McLaren’s MCL40 baseline is sound, but to extract the most performance, drivers will need to master the new power unit and aero modes
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella says that the Barcelona shakedown has proven that the MCL40's largest improvements will come from learning how to exploit the power unit as well as the active aero introduced this year.
The Woking outfit approached its testing at the Circuit de Barcelona Catalunya with the understanding that it would be its first sense of reality of a new set of regulations. Now, after a total of 291 laps driven by its drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, the Papaya-coloured team has a strong baseline, albeit one it will need to rapidly develop.
But Stella isn't afraid of the fact that overall performance will be dictated by how quickly teams and drivers can understand the "toolbox" of features these new regulations offer.
"It was a very useful three days," he said in an interview within the team. "We were able to collect a large amount of data and begin to understand how the new generation of single-seaters behave in reality on track and no longer solely on simulators."
The Italian was keen to add that the car reacted how they expected and in line with their simulations. This comes maybe as a breath of fresh air after the correlation issues experienced by several teams during the ground effect era.
"What we saw on the track was in line with expectations and, above all, with the simulations. What emerged clearly is that the learning curve is very steep for everyone – drivers and teams alike – which means that every lap teaches you something useful in terms of performance.
Oscar Piastri, McLaren
"After all, it was natural to expect such a scenario, considering that these cars are totally new, from A to Z. We know that the MCL40 is a good starting point, but now we have to work hard to develop it and, through our knowledge of the car, improve the overall performance of the package, both for the immediate future and to further define the development lines during the season."
He continued: "Although these are very preliminary indications, I believe that one of the areas where there is great room for improvement is in exploiting the new power unit and all the options available to the driver.
"There is also a lot of potential to be extracted in terms of managing the variable aerodynamic configuration, referring to the alternation between Corner and Straight Mode.
"That said, it is obvious that this generation of single-seaters is at a very early stage of development: four years ago, when ground effect cars made their debut, we were in different circumstances because the power unit and tyres were essentially unchanged from the previous year."
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Category: General Sports
