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Must McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That to Win, You Can't Always Play Fair?

The McLaren team are fully conscious of the difficulty they face with Verstappen and the Red Bull team in the championship battle this year, but they don't believe to change their strategy to running the team.

They will continue to provide both drivers the optimal opportunity they can and run the team on a foundation of fairness and equanimity.

"This is the way we plan competing. This is the philosophy in which we approach racing, and we want to stay equitable, and we want to maintain equal treatment to our drivers."

Team principal Andrea Stella is a seasoned expert of numerous championship fights. He won the title as race engineer to Raikkonen in 2007 when the Ferrari racer made up seventeen points under the previous points system in two Grands Prix to win the title, while the McLaren team imploded.

And he lost the title as engineer to Fernando Alonso in 2010, when Ferrari messed up their race strategy at the final race of the championship and allowed Vettel and Red Bull to snatch the championship from under their noses.

Andrea Stella stated after the race in Austin: "We view the next five races as opportunities to extend the lead on Max. And when it involves having to make a decision as to a team driver, this will only be determined by the numbers."

"We lean on the experience. I can recall at least 2007, 2010, in which you reach the final Grand Prix and it's actually the third-placed driver that wins the title. So we're not going to close the door unless this is closed by the calculations."

Why Did McLaren Cease Development on This Year's Car?

Every team this season have had to face the dilemma of for how long to focus on their 2025 season car while also making sure they are as ready as they can be for the significant regulation change scheduled for the 2026 season.

In F1, it's typically the situation that if a constructor gets it wrong at the beginning of a new rules cycle, it can take a long time to catch up. And if they succeed, that benefit can last for a while - look at the Red Bull team in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the rules were modified.

McLaren started this year with the fastest car, after investing a lot of innovation into their 2025 season design.

They continued to develop it for a period, but were finding reduced benefits. So when looking at the bang for buck they were getting on their 2025 season car compared to 2026, it became an easy decision to switch focus to next year.

Red Bull have caught up since bringing their new floor and nose section at the Monza Grand Prix, but the McLaren remains competitive - team principal Stella said he believed Norris had the speed to compete for the victory in Texas had he not ended up behind Leclerc.

"We must keep maximising the car performance and keep executing strong race weekends. And from this perspective, if you consider a race like Baku, we failed to optimize the performance and we didn't execute a perfect performance."

"Therefore we have a significant chance, and the result of this season and the driver's title is in our hands. It's not in someone else's hands."

Team Changes: How Challenging Is It to Change Constructors?

First of all, it's uncertain the inquiry has an entirely accurate premise. It's correct that each of Lewis Hamilton and Sainz had somewhat sticky opening phases of the championship, in different ways, and that they are currently performing significantly improved.

Sainz and Alex Albon do now appear quite balanced. However, it's less certain that, in Lewis Hamilton's case, he is yet the "match" of Charles Leclerc - or not regularly, at least.

Lewis Hamilton has not beaten Charles Leclerc very often at all this year, either in qualifying sessions or race.

He is now significantly nearer than he previously. He is consistently qualifying within a few hundredths of a second of Leclerc, but in qualifying battles it's 4-2 to Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This last weekend in Texas, on one of Hamilton's preferred tracks, he was a full second slower than his teammate when the Monaco driver completed his tire change, and dropped 13 seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

In hindsight, Charles Leclerc was on the best race strategy. Regardless, over the season, and even currently, it's hard to argue that on average Leclerc has hasn't been the better Ferrari driver this year.

Both Hamilton and Sainz have discussed how difficult it is to change constructors, and we have to take them at their word.

Hamilton would not claim even now that he was completely adjusted to the Ferrari car - and he is hoping the regulation changes next season will benefit his driving style; he has never particularly liked these venturi cars.

There is a great deal for a racing driver to understand and adapt to when they switch teams, as Lewis Hamilton has explained many times this year. But not all faces difficulties in this manner.

Fernando Alonso, for instance, was performing well from the start of the 2023 season when he transferred to the Aston Martin team. And would Max Verstappen struggle if he switched teams? I suspect most in F1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

When Will We Know Next Year's Team Performance?

Before the cars are driven for the first time in winter testing next year, nobody will understand how the teams are looking in the upcoming season.

The first test, in Barcelona on January 26-30, is behind closed doors because the teams preferred to get their heads around their initial track time of the power unit changes without the scrutiny of the media.

So the pair of sessions in Sakhir on 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the first time some kind of indication of comparative speed emerges.

But, as ever, it's not until the season opener that the complete and precise situation will emerge.