McLaren has confirmed that Oscar Piastri’s car will be equipped with the team’s whole upgrades from Miami at this weekend’s Formula 1 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
The Woking-based squad introduced a substantial number of updates at the last round, but Norris was the sole recipient of the entire package on his MCL38 charger.
Norris capitalised on McLaren’s latest improvements – and a well-timed Safety Car – to beat Red Bull’s Max Verstappen to land his maiden F1 win at the 110th attempt.
Meanwhile, Piastri, whose car was fitted with half the new parts, was circulating in second place in the nascent stages, but contact with Carlos Sainz ruined his race.
Stella denied in Miami that the difference in car specs had boiled down to a shortage of parts, and divulged that Piastri would receive the remaining updates at Imola.
Asked whether Piastri would be on an even pedestal with his team-mate at the next round, Stella said: “Yes, and I like I say it is not really a shortage of parts, it is that the upgrades require quite a lot of work and also we need to prove out that they work from a mechanical and aerodynamic point of view, that’s why you only go with one car.”
Stella also clarified that McLaren elected to run some comparison tests between the old and new car configurations to ensure that the latest parts ran without issue.
“Back to back, it is not only the back-to-back why you split,” he added.
“The changes in this kind of upgrade to sidepods and floor is very involved in terms of the design and in terms of building the car and so on.
“So you also do it to make sure everything runs reliably. So it is not only the performance comparison if that makes sense.”
The Italian had conceded at the MCL38’s launch that the engineers had run out of time to address some areas on the launch-spec car that it had wanted to improve.
Pressed on whether the Miami upgrades had therefore stemmed from those comments pre-launch, Stella answered: “In reality, from a planning point of view, yes,
“From a realisation point of view whether you achieve it or not depends on the fact that in your development you mature a package that is good enough to say, OK we go for it.
“You plan for it because you also need to see where you are with budget and what you can afford over the season, but then the fact that you actually materialise an upgrade depends on if there is good enough work in the aerodynamic department to actually mature the developmental parts into a package.
“So far I have to say our aerodynamic department did a fantastic job.”
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