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

The McLaren team are fully conscious of the difficulty they encounter with Verstappen and Red Bull in the drivers' championship this season, but they don't believe to alter their method to running the team.

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

"This is the manner we plan competing. This is the way in which we tackle competition, and we want to stay fair, and we want to maintain equal treatment to our drivers."

Team boss Andrea Stella is a seasoned expert of numerous title battles. He won the championship as race engineer to Raikkonen in the 2007 season when the Ferrari driver recovered seventeen points under the previous points system in two Grands Prix to win the title, while the McLaren team collapsed.

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

Stella said after the race in Texas: "We view the remaining five Grands Prix as chances to increase the lead on Max. And when it involves having to make a decision as to a driver, this will only be determined by mathematics."

"We rely on the past experience. I can recall at least 2007, the 2010 season, in which you go to the final Grand Prix and it's in fact the third-placed driver that claims the championship. So we're not going to close the door unless this is closed by mathematics."

What Prompted McLaren to Stop Upgrades on This Year's Car?

All teams this season have had to face the conundrum of for how long to focus on their 2025 season car while also ensuring they are as prepared as they can be for the major regulation change scheduled for 2026.

In F1, it's typically the case that if a constructor makes mistakes at the beginning of a new rules cycle, it can take a considerable period to catch up. And if they get it right, that benefit can last for a while - consider the Red Bull team in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the rules changed.

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

They continued to improve it for a while, but were experiencing reduced benefits. So when evaluating the value for money they were achieving on their 2025 car compared to the 2026 car, it became an straightforward choice to redirect attention to the following season.

Red Bull have closed the gap since bringing their updated floor and front wing at the Monza Grand Prix, but the McLaren car remains competitive - team boss Andrea Stella stated he thought Lando Norris had the pace to challenge for the victory in Austin had he not finished following Charles Leclerc.

"We must keep maximising the car performance and keep executing strong weekends. And from this point of view, if you think of a race like Baku City Circuit, we didn't maximise the performance and we didn't deliver a perfect performance."

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

Driver Transfers: How Challenging Is It to Change Constructors?

Initially, I'm not sure the question has an completely accurate premise. It's correct that each of Hamilton and Sainz had slightly sticky first halves of the championship, in different ways, and that they are currently faring significantly improved.

Sainz and Alex Albon do now appear very even. However, it's not so clear that, in Lewis Hamilton's case, he is yet the "match" 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 regularly setting times within a few hundredths of a second of his teammate, but in qualifying it's 4-2 to Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This last weekend in Texas, on one of Lewis Hamilton's favourite circuits, he was a second slower than his teammate when the Monaco driver made his tire change, and dropped thirteen seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

Looking back, Charles Leclerc was on the best strategy. Nevertheless, over the championship, and even currently, it's difficult to claim that on balance Leclerc has hasn't been the better Ferrari driver this season.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz have talked about how challenging it is to change constructors, and we have to take them at their word.

Lewis Hamilton would not claim even currently that he was completely adjusted to Ferrari - and he is hoping the new rules next season will suit him; he has never really enjoyed these ground-effect vehicles.

There is a lot for a driver to understand and adapt to when they switch teams, as Lewis Hamilton has described repeatedly this season. But not every driver faces difficulties in this manner.

Fernando Alonso, for example, was performing well from the beginning of the 2023 when he moved to Aston Martin. And would Verstappen face challenges if he switched teams? I believe most in F1 would expect not.

How Soon Can We Determine The Coming Season's Team Performance?

Until the F1 cars are driven for the initial time in winter testing next season, no-one will understand how the constructors are performing in the upcoming season.

The initial session, in Catalunya on January 26-30, is private because the constructors preferred to understand their initial track time of the new engines without the scrutiny of the press.

So the pair of sessions in Bahrain on February 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the first time a certain indication of comparative speed emerges.

But, as always, it's not until the first race that the true and accurate situation will emerge.