McLaren is a bit of a mystery. The team directed by Andrea Stella in Miami brought a substantially new MCL38 for Lando Norris and a half evolution entrusted to Oscar Piastri. After the Englishman’s brilliant second place in China, there was perhaps an expectation that he would get closer to Max Verstappen thanks to the upgrade package.
This was not the case: the papaya single-seaters were overtaken by Ferrari who wisely did not anticipate the changes expected in Imola, fearing the format of the Sprint Race which only allowed one free practice session for the development of the cars before the Shootout Qualifying. And in the end Norris and Piastri shared the third row separated by 81 thousandths of a second, settling for a fifth and sixth place which were not in the plans. Expectations were decidedly more ambitious.
McLaren went into crisis when the Florida citizen was fitted with the soft compound, the softest one. In Q3 Norris tried to put on the mediums in the first run, trying to repeat Friday’s exploit when with the yellows he found greater confidence with the car. The experiment (repeated by Mercedes in crisis) did not work, leaving doubts about the innovations introduced…
Norris, however, cuts it short: “The package works as expected, but in just one free practice session it is difficult to find all the potential. We won’t see it in Miami, maybe in Imola, but it will take two or three races to discover all its characteristics. We shouldn’t be in a hurry, but the innovations work if they give you an extra kilometer of speed or allow you to accelerate one meter earlier.”
The imperfect adaptation to the soft tire cost the Woking team something but they are looking positively at the race which will be held starting with the medium compound and then switching to the hard ones with just one pit stop.
Lando, therefore, plans to exploit in the race what was not seen in qualifying. But how does this MCL38 differ from the single-seater second in China? The version entrusted to Norris is a sort of evolution B, on which McLaren spent a good part of this season’s development budget.
McLaren MCL38 front wing comparison between old and new
Photo credit: McLaren
The new front wing can be recognized by the spoon of the main profile which is less pronounced, but is now more extended: the blowing it produces with the profile on which the nose rests ensures a greater passage of air for a different flow filling underneath to the body.
The head of aerodynamicists, Peter Prodomou, also worked on the front brake duct and the fairings of the pull rod suspension arms. The design of the external kinematics, in fact, allows the flows to be laminated more efficiently.
McLaren, technical detail of the new bellies with the narrower mouth and the longer visor
Picture of: Giorgio Piola
Rob Marshall and his partners have carried out a major intervention on the radiator openings: they were almost square in shape and are now decidedly wider, but also substantially narrower, definitely going in the direction of the Red Bull RB20 which leads the way.
It is interesting to note that the wing profile that acts as a carbon “visor” for the cooling intake of the Mercedes power unit is also completely new, with a significantly larger chord to be more cantilevered at the front.
McLaren MCL38: detail of the new curb
Picture of: Giorgio Piola
The design of the side has changed: the bodywork will certainly be more flared in the undercut to increase the air flow towards the rear axle, with the clear intention of increasing downforce.
Obviously the bottom pavement has been revised with a different extraction of the flow from the outermost Venturi tunnels. The two vortex generators are covered by the long longitudinal profile which gives rise to a very long scimitar.
McLaren MCL38: the more tapered bonnet and the wider and shorter bazooka
Photo by: Filip Cleeren
The bonnet is decidedly more profiled with a larger vertical fin and with a bazooka that seems to have inflated near the side gills, while it has become decidedly miniaturized at the tail. The rear wing has a decidedly more unloaded main profile, while the only element of the beam wing on a track that favors low downforce is not surprising.
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