McLaren has a new priority for 2024: fixing the phenomenon where the aerodynamics of its Formula 1 car deteriorate significantly at low downforce. The Grand Prix in Las Vegas last weekend showed that the competition seems to be better sorted out when there is low downforce.
And as the racing calendar includes more and more high-speed tracks, McLaren cannot afford to ignore this branch of development. Team boss Andrea Stella has admitted that all the team’s data suggests that his team loses much more than the competition in the low downforce trim.
“We seem to lose competitiveness when we have to drive the car with this level of drag,” he says. “Our own observations show that aerodynamics tend to switch off, so to speak.”
“I’m sure that’s the case for everyone, but it’s more about how pronounced this phenomenon is – and it looks like it’s a little bigger in our car than in some of our competitors.”
Stella said that the trend of high-speed road circuits such as Baku and Vegas meant that ignoring low-downforce performance was no longer an option for teams: “We will continue development for medium and high downforce as is, but step it up In any case, our efforts at low downforce to be prepared for these routes.”
“With Baku, Vegas, Monza and Spa there are now a decent number [Highspeed-] Races for which you have to have an optimized car. In the past it was just Spa and Monza. Now, with a few more races like this, it’s a priority.”
Linear downforce loss as a goal
Stella explains that the cars’ aerodynamics become very sensitive at low downforce because the flatter front wing affects the airflow around the front wheels, which is crucial to the car’s performance.
“If you choose a smaller rear wing, you have [aus Gründen der aerodynamischen Balance] also a flatter front wing. This often affects both ends [des Autos] because if you reduce the load on the front wing, you lose control of the airflow on the front tire.”
“That then affects the behavior of the car. There is therefore a point at which you can no longer simply do it in a linear manner [Abtrieb] loses, but more than linear. And we want to correct that back to a kind of linear loss.”
McLaren had developed an ultra-low downforce specification prior to the Las Vegas Grand Prix that only included a single beam wing element, but decided against using it because of the slippery track.
“We had a new rear wing flap,” adds Stella. “We also had another option to reduce the air resistance even further with the beam wing. But we didn’t use it because we thought that we would have to leave some downforce on the car due to the low grip on the asphalt. We did So we only used one of the two upgrades we had.”