Andrea Stella says the strength of McLaren’s technical departments will stand the team in good stead for the 2026 Formula 1 season.
McLaren struggled at the start of the ground effect era in 2022 and had one of the slowest cars on the grid at the start of 2023. But having turned that around and won back-to-back constructors’ championships – plus a drivers’ title this year – Stella says there is every reason to believe McLaren will remain competitive under the new regulations next season.
“These kinds of achievements are of course the result of the development of the entire team, but for this time I would like to make a special mention of the technical team,” said Stella.
“The engineering team ultimately conceived, designed and developed a car that was the ninth or tenth best car from the beginning of 2023, but was one of the best cars at the end of 2023, and then gradually became the best car – the best car, certainly in the first part of 2025. In any case, Red Bull gave us an important challenge in the second part of 2025, when we had already stopped development for a while.
“The technical team at McLaren is particularly strong, we can benefit from the contribution of Peter Prodromou, Rob Marshall, Neil Houldey, Mark Ingham, Giuseppe Pesce, Mark Temple… I think from this point of view this is one of the strongest technical departments I could have been part of in my career – 26 years in Formula 1.
“This means that although the specifics of the current regulations will not necessarily apply in the future, the way of working, the standards, the approach – to the development of the car, to the objectives from a technical point of view – they do apply to the future, and this makes us optimistic for the 2026 season.”
McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown says he is excited about the challenge of trying to build a new championship-winning car under new rules, and stressed that the team’s evolution back at the factory should not be overlooked.
“It’s been a great quest to get beyond where we were, not only on the track but off the track,” Brown said. “I think the commitment we’ve had from our shareholders, especially Mumtalakat, has been incredible from day one. All they want us to win is have a great brand and take care of our people. And I think because we take care of our people, we’ve achieved the results that we’ve achieved.”
“We have incredible sponsors and total support from our shareholders, our chairman, and that allows Andrea, I and our leadership team to put our heads down and get on with the job.
“As far as the rules are concerned, that’s the exciting part of Formula 1. We have to do it all over again. We’ve changed a lot on our car this year, so even though the rules haven’t changed significantly, our technical team hasn’t been sitting idle.
And just like our technical team, our leadership team – our CFO, our head of HR, our commercial team, our head of communications, chief of staff – they all have to do a great job, because the complexity of a Formula 1 team to put the technical team and the racing team in a position to win, a lot of things have to happen behind the scenes to even give them the tools, the resources and us, the people.
“So it’s a great achievement because we certainly earned it the hard way, and now we have to do it all over again. It will be tough, because the worst team in Formula 1 is really good. So not just the competition from the drivers… the competition from the teams – there are no small teams anymore, there are no minnow teams that we all grew up with. Everyone is running against the cost limit, the sport is incredibly healthy and it’s been a lot of fun.”
#McLaren #believes #depth #key #success #RACER