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Must McLaren Accept Reality of F1 - That if You Want Win, It's Not Always Possible to Play Fair?

McLaren are fully conscious of the obstacle they encounter with Max Verstappen and Red Bull in the championship battle this year, but they see no reason to modify their approach to running the team.

They will continue to provide both drivers the best chance they can and operate the team on a foundation of fairness and balance.

"This represents the approach we intend racing. This is the philosophy in which we tackle competition, and we aim to stay equitable, and we intend to apply equal treatment to both drivers."

Team boss Andrea Stella is a veteran of numerous championship fights. He won the championship as engineer to Raikkonen in the 2007 season when the Ferrari driver recovered seventeen points under the previous points system in two races to secure the title, while the McLaren team imploded.

And he missed out on the title as engineer to Alonso in the 2010 season, when Ferrari messed up their strategy at the last Grand Prix of the championship and enabled Vettel and the Red Bull team to snatch the championship from under their noses.

Andrea Stella said after the Grand Prix in Austin: "We look at the next five races as opportunities to increase the gap on Max. And when it comes to having to make a call as to a driver, this will only be determined by mathematics."

"We rely on the past experience. I can recall at least 2007, 2010, in which you go to the last race and it's in fact the third-placed driver that wins the title. So we're not going to close the door unless this is closed by the calculations."

Why Did McLaren Stop Upgrades on The Current Car?

Every team this year have had to confront the conundrum of for how long to concentrate on their 2025 season car while also making sure they are as prepared as they can be for the major regulation change coming for the 2026 season.

In Formula 1, it's usually the situation that if a team gets it wrong at the beginning of a new regulation period, it can take a considerable period to recover. And if they succeed, that benefit can continue for some time - consider Red Bull in 2022 and 2023, the most recent occasion the regulations changed.

McLaren started this season with the best car, after putting a lot of technical development into their 2025 design.

They continued to improve it for a while, but were experiencing diminishing returns. So when looking at the bang for buck they were getting on their 2025 car versus 2026, it became an straightforward choice to switch focus to the following season.

Red Bull have closed the gap since introducing their updated underfloor and nose section at the Italian Grand Prix, but the McLaren car stays competitive - team boss Andrea Stella stated he believed Norris had the pace to challenge for the win in Texas had he not finished behind Charles Leclerc.

"We must continue optimising the car performance and continue delivering strong race weekends. And from this point of view, if you think of a Grand Prix like Baku, we didn't maximise the performance and we didn't execute a perfect race."

"Therefore we have a significant chance, and the result of this season and the driver's title is in our control. It's not placed in another team's control."

Team Changes: How Difficult Is It to Change Constructors?

First of all, I'm not sure the question has an entirely accurate premise. It's true that both Hamilton and Carlos Sainz had slightly difficult first halves of the season, in varying manners, and that they are now performing significantly improved.

Carlos Sainz and Albon do now appear very even. However, it's less certain that, in Lewis Hamilton's case, he is currently the "equal" of Charles Leclerc - or not consistently, anyway.

Lewis Hamilton has failed to outperform Charles Leclerc very often at all this year, either in qualifying or race.

He is now significantly nearer than he was. He is regularly qualifying within a small fraction of a second of Leclerc, but in qualifying battles it's 4-2 to Charles Leclerc since the summer break.

This last weekend in Austin, on one of Lewis Hamilton's favourite circuits, he was a second slower than Leclerc when the Monaco driver completed his pit stop, and lost 13 seconds over the remaining portion of the Grand Prix.

Looking back, Charles Leclerc was on the best strategy. Regardless, over the championship, and even now, it's hard to argue that on average Charles Leclerc has hasn't been the superior Ferrari driver this year.

Both Lewis Hamilton and Sainz have discussed how challenging it is to change constructors, and we have to accept their statements.

Hamilton would not say even currently that he was fully adapted to Ferrari - and he is expecting the new rules next year will benefit his driving style; he has never really enjoyed these venturi cars.

There is a lot for a driver to get their head around when they switch teams, as Lewis Hamilton has described repeatedly this year. But not every driver struggle in this manner.

Alonso, for example, was performing well from the start of the 2023 when he transferred to the Aston Martin team. And would Max Verstappen face challenges if he switched teams? I suspect the majority in F1 would anticipate he wouldn't.

When Will We Know Next Year's Competitive Order?

Until the cars run for the initial time in pre-season testing next year, no-one will know how the teams are performing in the upcoming season.

The initial session, in Catalunya on 26-30 January, is private because the teams preferred to get their heads around their first running of the power unit changes without the scrutiny of the media.

So the pair of sessions in Sakhir on 11-13 and 18-20 February will be the first time some kind of sense of relative performance becomes apparent.

But, as always, it's only at the first race that the true and accurate situation will emerge.