McLaren boss Andrea Stella has revealed a key area that the team will be “exploiting” to ensure it maximises its chances of challenging in Formula 1 again this year.
The Woking-based squad enters 2026 as reigning Constructors’ and Drivers’ Champions, but continuity of its competitiveness remains uncertain due to the new radical regulations cycle.
With new cars featuring new characteristics and new equally-split hybrid power units, F1 and its title outcomes this year are the hardest to predict in years.
One added benefit for McLaren appears to be its use of the Mercedes power unit, which continues to be shrouded in intrigue due to its alleged illegality.
With the compression ratios able to reach higher than that of the regulated one, but via a loophole in the way the rulebook is written for this year, early projections indicate a 0.3s-a-lap advantage on the Albert Park Circuit, host of the first round of the calendar.
It is believed that the MCL40 is a package that is still a work in progress, and Stella has indicated that proper maximisation of the controversial engine will be a door to unlock greater performance from it.
“Although these are very preliminary indications, I believe that one of the areas where there is great room for improvement is in exploiting the new power unit and all the options available to the driver,” he said.
‘Different circumstances’ signals huge challenge for McLaren and other teams
“There is also a lot of potential to be extracted in terms of managing the variable aerodynamic configuration, referring to the alternation between Corner and Straight Mode.”
The 2026 rulebook is the biggest upheaval of F1 regulations since the beginning of the V6 hybrid era in 2014, one of few notable evolutions in that time being the ground-effect era which began in 2022, and ended last year.
Stella acknowledged that the jump between what came before ground-effect to that is smaller to the jump between ground-effect and what teams are faced with for this year.
“That said, it is obvious that this generation of single-seaters is at a very early stage of development,” the Italian said.
“Four years ago, when ground effect cars made their debut, we were in different circumstances because the power unit and tyres were essentially unchanged from the previous year.”
McLaren will be hoping for a positive showing in Bahrain this coming week, when the first of two official pre-season testing schedules commences in Bahrain.
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