Will the McLaren team Keep Playing Fair and Stop Verstappen? - Formula 1 Questions and Answers

Do McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That to Win, It's Not Always Possible to Be Fair?

McLaren are fully conscious of the obstacle they confront with Max Verstappen and the Red Bull team in the championship battle this year, but they see no reason to modify their approach to running the team.

They will persist to provide their two drivers the best chance they can and operate the team on a foundation of equity and balance.

"This represents the approach we plan competing. This remains the philosophy in which we tackle competition, and we aim to remain fair, and we want to apply equal treatment to both drivers."

Team principal Stella is a seasoned expert of many title battles. He claimed the championship as race engineer to Raikkonen in 2007 when the Ferrari racer recovered seventeen points under the previous points system in two Grands Prix to secure the title, while the McLaren team imploded.

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

Stella commented after the race in Texas: "We look at the next five races as chances to extend the lead on Verstappen. And when it comes to having to make a call as to a team driver, this will exclusively be determined by the numbers."

"We lean on the past experience. I can remember at least the 2007 season, 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 close the door unless this is determined by mathematics."

Why Did McLaren Cease Development on The Current Car?

Every team this season have had to confront the conundrum of how long to focus on their 2025 car while also making sure they are as ready as they can be for the major rules overhaul coming for 2026.

In Formula 1, it's typically the case that if a constructor gets it wrong at the start of a new regulation period, it can take a long time to recover. And if they get it right, that advantage can continue for some time - look at the Red Bull team in 2022 and 2023, the last time the rules were modified.

The McLaren team began this season with the best car, after putting a lot of innovation into their 2025 season design.

They continued to improve it for a while, but were finding reduced benefits. So when looking at the value for money they were getting on their 2025 season car compared to 2026, it became an easy choice to switch focus to next year.

The Red Bull team have closed the gap since bringing their updated floor and front wing at the Italian Grand Prix, but the McLaren stays competitive - team boss Stella said he believed Norris had the pace to challenge for the win in Texas had he not finished behind Charles Leclerc.

"We must continue optimising the car performance and keep delivering good race weekends. And from this perspective, if you consider a Grand Prix like Baku City Circuit, we didn't maximise the performance and we didn't deliver a perfect race."

"Therefore we have a significant chance, and the result of this championship and the driver's title is in our control. It's not in another team's control."

Driver Transfers: How Difficult Is It to Switch Teams?

First of all, I'm not sure the inquiry has an entirely correct basis. It's true that both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz had slightly difficult first halves of the championship, in varying manners, and that they are currently faring much better.

Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon do now appear very even. 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 very often at all this season, either in qualifying sessions or race.

He is currently significantly nearer than he previously. He is regularly qualifying within a few hundredths of a second of Leclerc, but in qualifying it's 4-2 to Charles Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This last weekend in Austin, on one of Hamilton's favourite tracks, he was a full second slower than his teammate when the Monegasque made his pit stop, and dropped thirteen seconds over the remaining portion of the race.

Looking back, Leclerc was on the optimal race strategy. Regardless, over the season, and even now, it's hard to argue that on balance Leclerc has not been the superior Ferrari driver this year.

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

Hamilton would not claim even now that he was completely adjusted to Ferrari - and he is hoping the regulation changes next year 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 switch teams, as Lewis Hamilton has explained repeatedly this year. But not every driver faces difficulties in this way.

Fernando Alonso, for instance, was performing well from the beginning of the 2023 season when he transferred to the Aston Martin team. And would Max Verstappen face challenges if he switched teams? I suspect the majority in F1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

When Will We Know The Coming Season's Team Performance?

Until the F1 cars run for the first time in pre-season testing next season, nobody will understand how the teams are looking next year.

The initial session, in Catalunya on 26-30 January, is private because the teams wanted to get their heads around their initial track time of the power unit changes without the prying eyes of the media.

So the two tests in Bahrain on 11-13 and February 18-20 will be the initial occasion a certain sense of relative performance emerges.

But, as ever, it's not until the first race that the complete and precise situation will become clear.