McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown praised the team’s rise to fourth place in the constructors’ championship.
But he also admitted Red Bull, who will finish far ahead of them in third place having already won three races this year, had made “a good strategic decision” by taking over the Honda engine deal which McLaren dropped two years ago.After switching from Honda to Renault, McLaren rose from ninth to sixth in the championship last year. However they struggled in the second half of the season, taking only four points from the last six races.
The team has already more than doubled its 2018 points haul, taken its first podium finish for five years, and confirmed its fourth place in the championship with one round to go.
“It’s been a big achievement given where we’ve been the last couple of years,” said Brown. “I think the team’s done an excellent job, both at the factory and at the race track.
“Everyone is contributing. Renault has played a big part in us getting more competitive again. They’ve been a fantastic partner.
“The drivers are doing a very good job, bringing the car home and in the points often. So it’s certainly been a pleasure racing this year, when I look back to Abu Dhabi last year.”
[icon2019autocoursempu]McLaren’s former engine supplier Honda has enjoyed a successful first season with Red Bull and recently confirmed it will continue to supply the team in 2021.
“Congratulations to Honda, it’s great that they’re going to be staying in the sport,” said Brown in response to a question from RaceFans. “I think that’s positive for the sport.
“You’ve got to give credit to [Red Bull motorsport consultant] Helmut Marko for making a good strategic decision to first put Honda into his B-team, and that worked our well, so he put it into his A-team. He’s got two good lieutenants in Christian [Horner] and Franz [Tost] running those teams and they’re winning races now and good on them and good for the sport.”
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Ipsom
29th November 2019, 17:52
Hopefully they can cap off the season with 6th in the standings for Sainz
Johns
29th November 2019, 18:04
I hope he is not saying that Renault would have done better if they stayed with Honda. The success of Honda was probably down to the synergy between Red Bull and Honda. McLaren just didn’t seem to know how to be successful with a fully paid engine deal.
Pironi the Provocateur (@pironitheprovocateur)
29th November 2019, 21:09
The issue with McLaren and Honda went all down to inexperience of both, but most crucial was Honda´s absolute lack of running with the engine. A season of testing with Toro Rosso was something they really needed – no pressure to deliver results, only improving bit by bit. Put it in a top chassis and…well, hats off to Red Bull and Honda, it could have been a magnificent distaster but they didn´t lose much and Honda improved immensely. McLaren are yet to build a first competitive car since 2012 (they really need to work on their suspensions and subsequent job with tyres), but it wasn´t only that they didn´t know how to be succesfull. Sure, they could have sponsored Manor somehow to get as much data from Honda as possible, but who´s to blame them now. No one, really no one around 2014, 2015 knew that the new regs would change the whole nature of F1 so drastically. Improvement comes really slowly nowadays, there´s no chance for anyone to catch up within 3-4 years.
Tristan (@skipgamer)
29th November 2019, 21:35
This is all such rubbish. The man is so politically correct, where’s his honest opinion?
Renault have done such fantastic job that we’re giving them the flick, and lol Horner and Red Bull? He’s just a lieutenant taking orders…
Tell us how you really feel Browny, this is F1, the pressers are half the show.
socksolid (@socksolid)
30th November 2019, 6:23
Mclaren has more than doubled its points haul for 2 years in a row. 30 in 2017, 64 in 2018 and now over 140 this year. It is the kind of progress they need to make. And keep making as red bull has proven the renault can occasionally win races which is not what mclaren has been even close to doing this year. So even with renault mclaren still has a lot of unrealised opportunities with their chassis.
This year the team ahead red bull will probably end up with 400 points or so. It has taken 2 years for mclaren to get from back of the field from 30 points to front of the mid field at 140+ points but the difference between 3rd and 4th is huge. It is massive step and bigger than going from 9th to 4th in my opinion. Mclaren essentially needs to double their points haul for 2020 and then almost double it again for 2021 just to catch up with red bull and just to move one position up. It is tough task but so far they are hitting that 2x mark. But at the same time mclaren is a big team and going from 9th to 4th should not be difficult and they are even now more or less worse off than they should be. They have done well but it is going to get harder to get where they should be at.