Stella gives Red Bull more worries as he reveals McLaren's future plan

F1 News

F1 upgrades for McLaren to concern Red Bull
16 September at 13:00
18
  • Matt Gretton
  • Editor-in-Chief

Andrea Stella has revealed that McLaren plans to upgrade their cars between now and the end of the 2024 Formula 1 season. The Woking-based team is attempting to maintain their lead over Red Bull Racing in the World Championship. The McLaren team boss didn't go into detail, but Red Bull Racing and Max Verstappen won't see it as good news.

Oscar Piastri won the Azerbaijan Grand Prix and took home 25 points. In the race's closing stages, it looked likely McLaren would take the lead in the Constructors' Championship, but perhaps by as little as one point. Sergio Perez then crashed with Carlos Sainz, costing Red Bull a lot of points in the World Championship. This also promoted Lando Norris to fourth. As a result, McLaren have a 20-point lead with seven Grands Prix and three sprint races remaining.

Will McLaren introduce more upgrades?

The rear wing was one of the secrets to McLaren's success in Baku. Over recent months, the team has introduced various upgrades, but Stella confirms they are not stopping in the coming races.

"We are definitely working on upgrades for this season. We are now finalising this. I don't want to disclose too much in terms of what and when, but we do have a plan to make the car faster," Stella, the McLaren boss, highlighted to GPblog and others in Baku.

However, Stella does offer a word of caution for Norris and Piastri. "Whether we will be able to do it or not, we will see because I think we have seen that at this level of development, it's not an easy task to actually change the specification of the car and get it to work as you expect in your development tools. But that's also why we took a bit more time to try and ensure that what we bring to trackside is successful," Stella added.

Red Bull Racing added an upgrade in Baku, but Red Bull's chief engineer, Paul Monaghan, suggested further evolution will occur at the United States Grand Prix in Austin. This event follows the Singapore Grand Prix and comes after an elongated break.