McLaren boss Andrea Stella explained why the team opted against the idea to start the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix on Soft tyres, an option taken by race rival Charles Leclerc.
Lando Norris finished the race at the Circuit of the Americas in second, behind runaway winner Max Verstappen, having jostled with Ferrari’s Leclerc all the way through.
The Monegasque overtook the McLaren at the start and stayed ahead for some time, until Norris eventually found a way through prior to the flurry of one-stops utilised by most teams.
Leclerc was the only driver in the top half of the field who started the on Softs, with all but 14 drivers on the grid starting on Mediums, as did the Brit.
For Leclerc, the gamble paid off to some extent, as he did manage to keep Norris behind for most of the race, before being finally dispatched with on Lap 51.
Speaking after the race, Stella told media including Motorsport Week that if he had managed to stay ahead of Leclerc at the start, Norris may well have been able to have beaten Verstappen.
“Well, first of all, I think in terms of the trend, today is a relatively reassuring race, because I think without having to fight with Charles, which was certainly an entertaining fight itself, I think Lando had the pace to win the race today,” he said.
“Obviously, he needed to gain the position on track, which is never easy with Max, and with a one-stop strategy, not necessarily we would have had many opportunities from a strategic point of view, but performance-wise, I think we are reassured that the pace was sufficient to fight for the victory.
“Like I’ve explained to some of your colleagues as well, I think not having done the sprint race left us a little bit on the back foot from a setup point of view, and in insight we can see already that there was more performance that we could have extracted from the car.”
McLaren ‘did not consider’ Soft tyre risk at US GP
Despite eventually finishing where he started, Ferrari’s risky move to start Leclerc on Softs worked relatively well, as he did look on course for second until Norris’ moribund Softs – bolted on after stopping for fresh rubber – found a new lease of life after he managed to cool them down and withstand further battle.
Asked if McLaren should have deployed the same tactic, Stella admitted it was not discussed at McLaren, but conceded that, for Ferrari and Leclerc, it proved to be a successful try.
“Honestly, it worked well for Leclerc, well done to Ferrari. I think this was a good way of keeping them in contention for finishing second.
“We did not consider that. We were a little surprised of seeing Ferrari starting on Soft. I think most on the grid will have been surprised because Leclerc was one of the few cars in the top 10, I think the only one in the top 10 starting on Soft.
“We were not even sure that a Medium-Soft could have been a feasible one-stop. So we just discovered through the race what the strategy should have been. We saw very early that the hard tyre wasn’t a good tyre because people were coming off the Hard tyre and therefore it looked like the Medium-Soft was a possibility.
“aSo in this sense, I think Ferrari had done a good job of anticipating that starting on soft was a good idea.
“Unfortunately for us, it cost us that Lando’s race was determined by Leclerc’s pace because he followed all the way, rather than by our overall pace.”
READ MORE – Lando Norris gives hilarious ‘if my mum had balls’ response to decisive F1 US GP moment
Discussion about this post