The Team Principal of McLaren, Andrea Stella, is hopeful that a series of upgrades for Spain and the future can allow the MCL38 to win on pure pace.
The Woking-based team has seen a recent stream of success. Lando Norris took his first win in Formula 1 at the Miami Grand Prix, and Oscar Piastri grabbed a sprint race victory in Qatar last year.
The two victories were deserved for both drivers, yet they each received a dash of support from a safety car. Luck, some may call it. But each driver makes their own luck, and being in the right place at the right time is crucial.
Norris was close in Montreal to grabbing his second victory. However, staying out one lap too long on the intermediate tyres when the track had dried up proved costly. Stella told Motorsport.com that having a faster car is more important than depending on the conditions.
He said: “This sort of little disappointment [in Montreal] for a victory that was possible is actually a testament to the fact that the team has come a long way and we are now regular podium contenders or at times even victory contenders.
“At the same time, I look at the positives, and there are many. Certainly the team has been consistent in being competitive, despite the variation of track conditions and so on, which is something that you never can take for granted.
“You don’t gain any credit because you’ve been like this in the past. You know, every race weekend, you have to gain your money.“
“So ultimately, we ideally should make the car a little bit faster, and then be in condition to chase the victory independent of the conditions on track or the track characteristics because we have to say that when we were in dry conditions, Mercedes was faster than us. So we’re still not in a position where we can gain the victory out of outright performance.”
Mercedes had brought their own upgrades to Montreal. These proved effective with George Russel grabbing pole position and a podium place.
McLaren is now looking for the same kind of improvement with their own upgrades, which Stella has teased with being just around the corner.
He said: “For the coming races, we will have some upgrades, but they won’t be a single kind of big upgrade like we have seen over the last 12 months.
“This is more some individual components where we found a little bit of performance and rather than waiting to deploy everything together once ready we take it track side.
“So I won’t say what, but we will see some new stuff coming over the few coming races.”
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Feature Image Credit: Motorsport.com