McLaren’s decision not to introduce a new floor design for the United States Grand Prix was made to assess its other new components without “any confusion”.
The Woking team brought a revised front wing and front suspension package, in addition to a series of changes to its rear brake duct furniture and rear wing.
However, McLaren stopped short of introducing a new floor design that has been in progress at its base, electing not to spend the four-week gap between Singapore and Austin fast-tracking it.
Engineering technical director Neil Houldey revealed that the team needed to be completely sure that the in-development floor works before manufacturing it.
He added that the scope of updates that McLaren brought to Austin was quite small, but “should give us a little bit of performance opportunity” further down the line.
Lando Norris appeared to confirm this yesterday after sprint qualifying, noting that the car was “basically the same” as the Singapore spec. The Briton had been given the full set of upgrades for Austin, while Piastri was without the new front wing.
Houldey felt that it was important to judge the other updates in isolation, rather than putting everything together in one package.
“We brought a lot of small upgrades for this event. I don’t really want to go into too many details about what will appear at the next events, but there’ll be more coming, for sure,” Houldey explained.
Lando Norris, McLaren MCL38
Photo by: Andreas Beil
“What we’ve been doing is just continue our development progress throughout the year and at the moment, it turns out, really, that what we want to do is bring something that we know works.
“So we’re not trying to deliver something early. We’re in a good position in the championship.
“But what we don’t want to do is bring any confusion into the team about the results of the components we’re bringing. So we’re waiting and bringing them when they’re ready.
“We want it on the car. We want the performance on the car as soon as we can possibly get it.”
Houldey denied that the limited practice available in a sprint weekend was a factor, reiterating that McLaren simply wanted to make sure any floor upgrades were worthy of being added to the car.
He felt that, although McLaren’s presence in the title battle adds scrutiny to its upgrade path, the team was dealing with it in the right way.
“We’re just ensuring that when we bring the parts, they’re the right ones, and they’re going to bring performance to the track,” Houldey continued.
“Aerodynamically, we already know the upgrades that we’re going to be bringing to the next couple of events. So they’re ready in that sense, but they’re very much in manufacture back at the factory.
“We just bring it to the event that we can get it to in the fastest possible way. So whether it’s a sprint or a standard event, doesn’t make a difference to us.
“From our perspective, we’re fully focused on our own technical development, and it’s important for us to just focus on where we are and what we bring to the races and not what other teams are doing.
“We’re learning what it’s like to be back at the front again. So for sure, the scrutiny that that brings is new to us, and I think we’re dealing with it in the right way.”
