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Do McLaren Face the Truth of F1 - That to Win, It's Not Always Possible to Play Fair?

McLaren are well aware of the difficulty they confront with Verstappen and Red Bull in the drivers' championship this season, but they see no reason to change their strategy to running the team.

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

"This represents the way we plan racing. This is the method in which we approach racing, and we aim to remain fair, and we want to maintain equal treatment to our drivers."

Team principal Stella is a veteran of numerous title battles. He won the title as engineer to Kimi Raikkonen in the 2007 season when the Ferrari racer recovered 17 points under the old scoring system in two races to win the title, while McLaren imploded.

And he missed out on the title as engineer to Alonso in the 2010 season, when the Ferrari team messed up their race strategy at the final race of the season and allowed Sebastian Vettel and the Red Bull team to snatch the title from their grasp.

Andrea Stella commented after the Grand Prix in Austin: "We view the remaining five Grands Prix as opportunities to extend the lead on Max. And when it comes to having to make a decision as to a team driver, this will exclusively be led by mathematics."

"We rely on the experience. I can recall at least 2007, 2010, in which you go to the last race and it's actually the [driver in] third [place] that wins the championship. So we're not going to make decisions unless this is determined by mathematics."

Why Did McLaren Cease Upgrades on The Current Car?

All teams this year have had to confront the dilemma of for how long to concentrate on their 2025 season car while also making sure they are as ready as they can be for the significant regulation change coming for 2026.

In Formula 1, it's usually the case that if a team makes mistakes at the beginning of a new rules cycle, it can take a considerable period to recover. And if they get it right, that advantage can last for a while - look at Red Bull in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the regulations were modified.

McLaren began this season with the best car, after investing a lot of technical development into their 2025 design.

They did continue to improve it for a while, but were experiencing reduced benefits. So when evaluating the bang for buck they were getting on their 2025 season car compared to the 2026 car, it became an easy decision to redirect attention to the following season.

Red Bull have caught up since bringing their new floor and nose section at the Monza Grand Prix, but the McLaren car remains competitive - team principal Andrea Stella said he believed Lando Norris had the speed to challenge for the win in Austin had he not finished behind Leclerc.

"We just have to continue maximising the car performance and keep executing strong weekends. And from this point of view, if you think of a Grand Prix like Baku City Circuit, we didn't maximise the performance and we didn't execute a flawless race."

"Therefore we have a significant opportunity, and the outcome of this championship and the drivers' championship is in our control. It's not in someone else's hands."

Driver Transfers: How Difficult Is It to Change Constructors?

Initially, I'm not sure the question has an entirely accurate premise. It's true that both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz had slightly sticky first halves of the championship, in different ways, and that they are now faring significantly improved.

Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon currently appear quite balanced. However, it's not so clear that, in Hamilton's case, he is yet the "equal" of Charles Leclerc - or not regularly, anyway.

Lewis Hamilton has failed to outperform Charles Leclerc frequently at all this season, either in qualifying or race.

He is currently much closer than he previously. He is regularly setting times within a small fraction of a second of his teammate, but in qualifying it's four-two to Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This previous weekend in Texas, on one of Lewis Hamilton's preferred circuits, he was a second behind Leclerc when the Monegasque made his pit stop, and lost 13 seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

Looking back, Charles Leclerc was on the best race strategy. Nevertheless, over the championship, and even currently, it's hard to claim that on average Leclerc has not been the better Ferrari driver this year.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz have discussed how difficult it is to switch teams, and we have to accept their statements.

Lewis Hamilton would not claim even now that he was fully adapted to the Ferrari car - and he is expecting the regulation changes next season will benefit his driving style; he has never really enjoyed these ground-effect vehicles.

There is a lot for a driver to get their head around when they change constructors, as Hamilton has described repeatedly this year. But not all struggle in this way.

Alonso, for example, was performing well from the beginning of the 2023 when he transferred to the Aston Martin team. And would Max Verstappen face challenges if he switched teams? I suspect the majority in Formula 1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

How Soon Can We Determine Next Year's Competitive Order?

Before the cars run for the first time in pre-season testing next year, nobody will know how the teams are looking next year.

The initial session, in Catalunya on 26-30 January, is behind closed doors because the teams preferred to understand their initial track time of the new engines without the prying eyes of the media.

So the pair of sessions in Bahrain on 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the first time some kind of sense of relative performance emerges.

But, as ever, it's only at the first race that the true and accurate picture will become clear.