Andrea Stella takes cues from Schumacher-era Ferrari

Andrea Stella, who now leads the McLaren team, joined Ferrari in 2000 as an engineer and worked closely with the people who led the Scuderia to success in the first half of the 2000s – Michael Schumacher, Jean Todt, Ross Brawn, Rory Byrne et al.

In the latest episode of the Beyond the Grid podcast, Andrea Stella said that much of Ferrari’s success in those years was down to the team’s leading specialists staying in their positions for years. Stella believes that continuity is still an important part of success today, so he aims to recreate at McLaren the approach that Ferrari took more than twenty years ago.

Andera Stella: “The experience and professionalism of the people who worked at Ferrari were exceptional. Some of them agreed to stay in their positions, although they were willing to take a few steps forward and take higher positions by moving to other teams. However, they agreed to stay as it was necessary to create probably the strongest team in the history of Formula 1.

Ferrari achieved continuity and built the team brick by brick. I think this is exactly what we missed during the years of Fernando Alonso’s performances. Continuity and employee experience are one of the components of the success scenario.

We definitely want McLaren to have experienced people too. We want to fight with Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari. This in itself is a difficult mission and we must be well prepared for it.

That’s why we’re excited to have David Sanchez and Rob Marshall join us. They have the experience and vision of what the current generation of cars and the cars of 2026 should look like.”