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Must McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That if You Want Win, You Can't Always Be Fair?

The McLaren team are well aware of the obstacle they face with Verstappen and Red Bull in the championship battle this season, but they see no reason to modify their approach to running the team.

They will continue to give both drivers the best chance they can and operate the team on a basis of equity and equanimity.

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

Team boss Andrea Stella is a veteran of many championship fights. He claimed the championship as race engineer to Raikkonen in the 2007 season when the Ferrari racer recovered seventeen points under the previous points system in two Grands Prix to win the championship, while the McLaren team collapsed.

And he lost the title as race engineer to Alonso in the 2010 season, when the Ferrari team made errors in their race strategy at the final race of the season and enabled Sebastian Vettel and the Red Bull team to sneak the championship from their grasp.

Andrea Stella said after the Grand Prix in Austin: "We view the next five races as opportunities to increase the gap on Verstappen. And when it involves having to make a decision as to a driver, this will only be determined by mathematics."

"We rely on the experience. I can remember at least the 2007 season, the 2010 season, in which you go to the last race and it's in fact 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 Upgrades on This Year's Car?

All teams this year 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 major regulation change scheduled for the 2026 season.

In F1, it's typically the situation that if a constructor makes mistakes at the start of a new rules cycle, it can take a long time to recover. And if they succeed, that benefit can continue for some time - consider the Red Bull team in 2022 and 2023, the last time the rules changed.

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

They did continue to improve it for a while, but were finding reduced benefits. So when looking at the value for money they were achieving on their 2025 car versus the 2026 car, it became an easy decision to switch focus to next year.

The Red Bull team have closed the gap since bringing their updated underfloor and nose section at the Italian Grand Prix, but the McLaren stays competitive - team boss Stella said he thought Lando Norris had the speed to compete for the victory in Austin had he not ended up following Leclerc.

"We must continue optimising the performance and keep delivering strong weekends. And from this perspective, if you think of a Grand Prix like Baku, we didn't maximise the car's potential and we didn't deliver a perfect race."

"So definitely we have a large chance, and the result of this championship and the drivers' championship is in our hands. It's not in someone else's hands."

Driver Transfers: How Difficult Is It to Switch Teams?

Initially, I'm not sure the inquiry has an completely correct premise. It's correct that both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz had slightly difficult opening phases of the championship, in varying manners, and that they are now performing significantly improved.

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

Lewis Hamilton has failed to outperform Charles Leclerc frequently at all this year, either in qualifying sessions or Grand Prix.

He is currently much closer than he was. He is consistently qualifying within a few hundredths of a second of his teammate, but in qualifying battles it's 4-2 to Charles Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This previous weekend in Austin, on one of Lewis Hamilton's preferred tracks, he was a full second behind his teammate when the Monaco driver made his tire change, and dropped 13 seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

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

Both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz have talked about how difficult it is to change constructors, and we have to accept their statements.

Lewis Hamilton would not say even currently that he was fully adapted to the Ferrari car - and he is expecting the regulation changes next year will benefit his driving style; he has never really enjoyed these venturi cars.

There is a great deal for a racing driver to get their head around when they change constructors, as Lewis Hamilton has explained repeatedly this season. But not all struggle in this way.

Alonso, for example, was performing well from the start of the 2023 season when he moved to Aston Martin. And would Verstappen struggle if he switched teams? I believe most in F1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

When Will We Know The Coming Season's Competitive Order?

Before the cars are driven for the first time in pre-season testing next season, nobody will know how the constructors are performing in the upcoming season.

The initial session, in Catalunya on January 26-30, is behind closed doors because the constructors wanted to understand their first running of the new engines without the scrutiny of the press.

So the pair of sessions in Sakhir on February 11-13 and February 18-20 will be the initial occasion some kind of indication of relative performance becomes apparent.

But, as always, it's not until the season opener that the complete and precise picture will become clear.