Christian Horner Dissects McLaren’s Race Strategy in Suzuka

In the thrilling race at Suzuka, Max Verstappen, the reigning champion, outshone his rivals with a stunning pole lap. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri of McLaren found themselves chasing Verstappen in an intrinsically quicker car, as the one-stop race offered few overtaking opportunities.

The Dilemma of Equal Driver Status at McLaren

In the second stint, Piastri requested a position swap and an opportunity to challenge Verstappen. However, team boss Andrea Stella was hesitant, doubting whether Piastri was indeed faster than Norris due to the Red Bull’s dirty air.

Stella expressed his doubts, stating, “I don’t think it is so clear that Oscar was faster.” He further explained, “Lando was trying to get Max’s slipstream even closer, but anytime you went below a second there was a significant loss of grip.

The Challenges Faced by McLaren in Overcoming Verstappen

At Suzuka, a performance advantage of seven to eight tenths was required to overtake. This proved a daunting task for Piastri and Norris. Horner, while admiring McLaren‘s dual front-running cars, felt their equal driver approach also came with compromises that made it harder for the team to attack Verstappen.

Horner explained, “I guess the problem they have is they have two drivers that are fighting for the drivers’ championship.” He continued, “The difficulty they have is that they’ve made a bet where they’re going to let them race. So that’s the compromise that inevitably comes with that.

When asked if Norris could have beaten Verstappen by pitting one lap earlier, Horner replied, “The undercut was reasonably powerful. There’s ‘could have, should have, would have’, I’m sure, up and down the pitlane.” He further added, “I think the majority of the hard work was done on Saturday. I guess 90% of the cars finished in the order that they started in. It was a flat-out sprint race today. There was very low degradation.

Horner concluded, “We know the McLarens are very, very fast. And it needed Max to be inch perfect with two very fast s right behind him.” For 53 laps he made not a single mistake and had the pace to cover them, keep them out of his DRS. I think that’s one of Max’s best weekends.