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Do McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That to Win, You Can't Always Be Fair?

The McLaren team are well aware of the difficulty they encounter with Verstappen and the Red Bull team in the drivers' championship this year, but they see no reason to change their strategy 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 equanimity.

"This is the approach we plan competing. This is the philosophy in which we tackle racing, and we aim to stay equitable, and we want to apply equality to both drivers."

Team principal Andrea Stella is a veteran of numerous championship fights. He claimed the championship as engineer to Raikkonen in 2007 when the Ferrari racer recovered 17 points under the old scoring system in two races to win the championship, while the McLaren team imploded.

And he lost the championship as engineer to Alonso in the 2010 season, when the Ferrari team messed up their race strategy at the last Grand Prix of the season and allowed Vettel and the Red Bull team to sneak the championship from under their noses.

Stella stated after the race in Austin: "We look at the remaining five Grands Prix as chances to extend the lead on Max. And when it involves having to make a call as to a driver, this will exclusively be led by mathematics."

"We rely on the past experience. I can recall at least 2007, 2010, in which you reach the final Grand Prix and it's in fact the [driver in] third [place] that claims the title. So we're not going to close the door unless this is determined by mathematics."

What Prompted McLaren to Cease Development on The Current Car?

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

In F1, it's typically the situation that if a team gets it wrong at the start of a new regulation period, it can take a long time to catch up. And if they succeed, that benefit can continue for some time - consider Red Bull in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the rules were modified.

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

They continued to develop 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 straightforward choice to redirect attention to next year.

The Red Bull team have closed the gap since introducing their new underfloor and front wing at the Italian Grand Prix, but the McLaren car stays competitive - team principal Andrea Stella said he believed Norris had the pace to compete for the victory in Austin had he not ended up following Charles Leclerc.

"We just have to keep maximising 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 large opportunity, and the result of this championship and the driver's title is in our hands. It's not in another team's control."

Driver Transfers: How Challenging Is It to Switch Teams?

First of all, I'm not sure the question has an completely accurate premise. It's correct that both Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz had somewhat difficult first halves of the season, in varying manners, and that they are currently performing much better.

Sainz and Albon do now look quite balanced. However, it's not so clear that, in Hamilton's case, he is yet the "equal" of Leclerc - or not consistently, at least.

Lewis Hamilton has not beaten Leclerc frequently at all this year, either in qualifying or race.

He is now significantly nearer than he previously. He is consistently setting times within a few hundredths of a second of his teammate, but in qualifying battles it's four-two to Charles Leclerc since the mid-season break.

This last weekend in Austin, on one of Lewis Hamilton's favourite tracks, he was a second behind Leclerc when the Monegasque made his pit stop, and lost thirteen seconds over the rest of the race.

In hindsight, Charles Leclerc was on the best race strategy. Nevertheless, over the championship, and even now, it's hard to argue that on average Leclerc has hasn't been the better Ferrari driver this year.

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

Hamilton would not say even now that he was fully adapted to the Ferrari car - and he is hoping the regulation changes next year will suit him; he has never particularly liked these venturi cars.

There is a great deal for a racing driver to get their head around when they switch teams, as Hamilton has explained repeatedly this year. But not every driver faces difficulties in this way.

Alonso, for instance, was on it from the beginning of the 2023 season when he moved to Aston Martin. And would Max Verstappen face challenges if he switched teams? I suspect the majority in F1 would expect not.

How Soon Can We Determine The Coming Season's Competitive Order?

Until the cars are driven for the initial time in pre-season testing next year, no-one will know how the teams are performing next year.

The first test, in Catalunya on January 26-30, is behind closed doors because the constructors wanted to get their heads around their initial track time of the power unit changes without the scrutiny of the media.

So the pair of sessions in Sakhir on 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the initial occasion some kind of sense of relative performance becomes apparent.

But, as ever, it's only at the first race that the true and accurate situation will become clear.