{"id":320517,"date":"2023-08-01T07:03:47","date_gmt":"2023-08-01T07:03:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=320517"},"modified":"2023-08-01T07:58:53","modified_gmt":"2023-08-01T07:58:53","slug":"mclaren-chasing-urgent-fix-as-cold-reality-hits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=320517","title":{"rendered":"McLaren chasing 'urgent' fix as cold reality hits"},"content":{"rendered":"

McLaren<\/a> are scrambling to solve a sudden drop-off in pace after their Saturday heroics came crashing down on Sunday at the Formula 1<\/a> Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

The papaya team enjoyed an uptick at the British Grand Prix where Lando Norris<\/a> stood on the podium and Oscar Piastri<\/a> wasn't far off it in fourth.<\/p>\n

That offered some optimism within the camp heading to Belgium, although the team was keen to downplay their chances pre-event.<\/p>\n

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Nevertheless, Piastri shone again and qualified on the front row for Saturday's sprint race to the surprise of many.<\/p>\n

\"Oscar<\/p>\n

He led briefly before being overtaken by eventual winner Max Verstappen of Red Bull, the Aussie young gun finishing second.<\/p>\n

Sunday's grand prix couldn't have been further away as far as results go.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Piastri made race-ending contact with Ferrari's Carlos Sainz on lap one while Norris was left languishing in seventh after a "terrible" race in which he struggled with car balance.<\/p>\n

With the summer break ahead of them, McLaren team boss Andrea Stella admitted "urgent work" is needed to overcome the sudden switch in pace that Norris suffered.<\/p>\n

"This weekend told us where we could do work," said Stella.<\/p>\n

\"Lando<\/p>\n

"The car is improved in some areas. This was confirmed. But, at the same time, this weekend confirmed the areas that we haven't addressed yet.<\/p>\n

"(It) gives us a reality check that there's more work to do and, to some extent, confirms that those areas, they need to be addressed quite urgently.<\/p>\n

"This urgency, for instance, comes from the fact that a second race after (the) shutdown is Monza. You can't go racing in Monza like (we did in Spa).<\/p>\n

"So, there's urgent work that needs to happen at McLaren to fix the situation."<\/p>\n

The fundamental flaw in the MCL60 is its low downforce set-up.<\/p>\n

Spa-Francorchamps is a particularly high-speed circuit with several long straights.<\/p>\n

The team reportedly came to the Stavelot circuit without an optimised low downforce rear wing like other teams.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/twitter.com\/OscarPiastri\/status\/1685665300648255490<\/a><\/p>\n

The Italian Grand Prix, which follows the Dutch Grand Prix when the season resumes, is made up almost entirely of long straights and chicanes.<\/p>\n

"We have to very frankly admit that, while this configuration gave us an advantage in the previous days (sprint race), (the GP) was starting to be a significant issue," said Stella.<\/p>\n

"Overall, let's say there's some learning we take out of this weekend. I think the opportunity to remark is not like we necessarily wanted to target this configuration.<\/p>\n

"Fixing the efficiency of the car at low drag is on the to-do list, but it was lower than some of the priorities that we have worked on in the previous months."<\/p>\n

Formula 1 returns on August 27 for the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort.<\/p>\n

\ufeffFor a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

McLaren are scrambling to solve a sudden drop-off in pace after their Saturday heroics came crashing down on Sunday at the Formula 1 Belgian Grand […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":320519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320517"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=320517"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":320522,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320517\/revisions\/320522"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/320519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=320517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=320517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=320517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}