Stella on the moments of the season that became crucial for McLaren

The start of the past season for McLaren can hardly be called impressive: it became clear during the winter tests that the MCL60 car did not meet the team’s expectations. However, an aggressive approach to chassis modernization allowed a real breakthrough to be achieved in the future, and from the Austrian stage of the championship, McLaren’s affairs began to improve.

During the race weekend in Spielberg, a series of technical innovations were installed only on Lando Norris’ car and it turned out that everything worked as expected, after which McLaren was seen as one of the most promising teams in the second half of the season.

When Andrea Stella was asked which moment of the season he considered the turning point, the team manager from Woking focused on the Austrian weekend.

“It’s hard to pinpoint one specific moment,” he replied while taking part in Australia’s KTM Summer Grill podcast. – In answering your question I will simply rely on my instincts and my feelings, and I remember the first laps in Austria.

For the first practice, Lando drove the updated car, and Oscar the old version, and from the telemetry I could see that Lando could take the corners at a much higher speed. I remember thinking at the time: “This is already good!”

Overall there are good memories of that weekend and fortunately the first positive impressions were supported first by lap times and then by results.”

In Austria, Norris came 4th in qualifying and finished 4th in the race. A week later he was already on the podium in Great Britain and finished second. At Silverstone his partner, Oscar Piastri, had a new car at his disposal and also claimed a place in the top three, but finished fourth.

“The McLaren car was leading that race,” Stella recalls. – Both drivers should have been on the podium, but Oscar failed to do so because the safety car appeared on the track at the wrong time. But we can say that we then received confirmation: the team is strong and on the right track.

The effective development of the car continued and everyone at McLaren saw it later in the season, but those two weekends were, if you like, the turning points.”

At the end of the championship, McLaren took 4th place in the Constructors’ Championship, and the drivers reached the podium nine times in the second half of the year, with Piastri winning the Saturday sprint in Qatar.