McLaren have officially unveiled their car for the 2024 season, having revealed the livery they’d be using last month.
McLaren are one of the most exciting teams going into the 2024 season after their strong second half of 2023. They scored 9 podiums and a sprint race win for Oscar Piastri in Qatar after bringing in an overhaul to their car at the Austrian Grand Prix.
CEO for McLaren Zak Brown noted that whilst the team needed to “be realistic”, given that everyone would have made progress over the winter, they were also expecting to be in a strong position come the start of the season.
“I think it has been a good winter, we’re happy with the development – it feels like we’ve continued on our development pace from where we were during the second half of last year. So long as the data is accurate I think we should start pretty strong – we definitely feel we’ve taken a step forward.”
Lando Norris has developed into one of the best drivers on the grid over the last few years, and though he scored six 2nd place finishes last season, he is still yet to win a race in F1. However, the Brit feels that this could be the year that stat changes.
“If there’s any season I have had some confidence, I think it’s going to be this one. Because the team is in the best place its ever been, I thought I’m in the best place I’ve ever been, and we’re just on a little bit of a roll so we want to keep that up.”
The positive language of the car is a notable contrast compared to the way the team spoke about the MCL60 during its launch event last year. And whilst McLaren’s 2024 car has made numerous improvements, Team Principal Andrea Stella noted that some upgrades will need to be made during the course of the season.
“There are a number of innovations on the car, but not all the areas we want to address have been completed for our launch-spec car. Those areas now become the focus of our in-season development.
The team has done a good job over the winter, and we are confident we can hit the ground running, but we know we have important tasks to complete before the season begins.”
