P1 with Matt and Tommy - Our honest thoughts on McLaren in 2024

Episode Date: October 9, 2024

We're prepping ourselves for a fascinating end to the 2024 F1 season - but how did we get here? We recap some of the pivotal moments in both championship races this year and wonder where McLaren have gone wrong. Our North American tour is underway! There are a few tickets available for LA and Austin next week - get them right here!Sign up to our Patreon here! You'll get access to bonus episodes, our classic race series, every P1 episode ad-free and access to our Discord server where you can chat with other F1 fans!Follow us on socials! You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, Twitch, YouTube and TikTok. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello everybody, welcome back to the P1 podcast with Matt and Tommy. Holiday edition, that's right. We are on autumnal holidays still. We are pining for Formula One to return. It's not long away now, is it, when the episode goes out, Tommy? So everyone will be excited to see how good Red Bull are going to be with their upgrades. Will they have fixed their car and all that sort of stuff? But that's not what we're going to talk about today, Tommy.

We're going to talk about Schumacheran be leading both championships. And I feel like we might know the answer, but we're going to go into it a bit more, aren't we? We are going to deep dive into it. Yeah, the fact that we've got this long or break now, at least the positive is that we have a championship battle to talk about because we did not expect to be doing this by October. I think we'd probably be expecting to have written in our content plan

to have congratulated Maxa Stappen on his title after what happened in Bahrain, but instead we've got a championship battle to talk about. We have got a championship battle to talk about as much as no one truly believed that this would happen. One, because of Max's beginning of the season, but two, because McLaren have not exactly maximized their results so far, have they? So I think the first talking point, let's start with McLaren. And what comes to mind as their biggest dropped points this year? Now, I think the big standout one, obviously, in terms of more, more, more.

dropped points from a Landon Norris perspective, right? That's what we're talking about here. It's not necessarily a constructors thing. They're winning the constructors. I think we'd safely predict it's very likely or maybe it's very likely too fair. In my opinion, it's very likely they're going to win the Constructors' Championship. So here we're talking about the Drivers' Championship. It has to be a done deal for the constructors, but we'll see.

The season has been so unpredictable. Maybe Ferrari. But we'll get on to them another day. So obviously we're going to talk about Lando's swinging points, obviously, in Hungary. Let's maybe dissect that first slightly. Because, of course, Lando finishing second, Oscar finishing first. That's a seven-point swing. Seven points.

That went down the toilet. I think that that was very much a McLaren issue. That was Lando Norris also sort of putting his sort of, putting his feet down and going no, no, I'm not going to let him through and then let him through at the wrong point and then obviously gave up the points much too late to be able to actually take

the position back anyway. That's one moment, of course, that I think we'll probably take the headlines when we go out of this season and Landau doesn't win the title by five points or something. I think for that one, the key is that it's in McLaren's hands. You know, we'll dive into this.

I think there's a lot of races this year. that Lando himself has left a bit or more on the table and could have got a lot more points. But that one is literally like the easiest thing in the world to bag some extra points. Some will say it was too early. Of course, you know, you've got a lot of stick for saying that there was even a championship fight

and I guess look at where we are now. It's very much, you know, he would, he would love to have those extra seven points now. It would just put that pressure on even more because it is a big margin. He's not taking a huge amount of Max's lead out after all these races. And then, yeah, I think Hungary is definitely the easy one that they could have just switched because that is in McLaren's hands.

And then the other one was Monza, which you can argue was a lot closer to the end of the championship. and there was all this talk of Oscar Piastri not wanting to give up a win, which he wouldn't have done because it was a second place, just a swap for third and a few more points. And I've seen a lot of people on Twitter going, oh my God, like, this is pathetic, it's ridiculous. Championships have been won by literally half a point in Formula One.

Many championships have been won by a single point. There's that stat that pains me to this day that give a lot of, zone extra five points in his career and he's a five-time Formula One world champion. That doesn't haunt you at all at night. No, not at all. They are such fine margins in Formula One. You have to maximise everything. So from there, from McLaren's side, they're definitely ones that are just, that's an easy, what,

10 points that they've just thrown away. Yeah. And I think after Italy, there was this big old viral phrase that went out, which was they want Oscar to be vouchery when Lando isn't Hamilton or something along those lines. You know, basically alluding to the fact that Lando doesn't deserve for this treatment because he's not Lewis Hamilton with Bottas. But this always was... Regardless of even if that is the case, like...

It's not about that, right? And this is never what we've said. It's been McLaren not being able to just get their drivers in order in order to win this driver's championship. We've never said once that it's Oscar Piastri's fault for what he's, you know,

the moves he's made in Italy or winning in Hungary. He's doing what he's allowed to do at the time, what McLaren have said you can do whether some of those rules papaya rules might have been slightly a grey area.

But it's always been a McLaren thing, at least for those two, right? Lando could have, should have won Italy, had Oscar not gone around the outside of him, had a great opportunity there, maybe not, we don't know, because obviously he wasn't that great on his tyres, but it's an opportunity and then Hungary as well.

One I want to throw in, which perhaps maybe goes under the radar slightly, was Austria, where he, of course, had the collision with Max. Now, I'm not saying that that was, I'm not saying that particular part, but I remember Lando saying after the race, I believe, that he could have carried on. should have carried on and it was almost bordering on a rage quit of like,

no, cars too screwed because I think you hear them on the team radio no cars completely finished whatever and on reflection they were so far ahead

that Lando even with a pit stop change of front wing front tire could have still scored some points I mean look how Max got fifth yeah Max ended up fifth that's a ten points that's huge

that's massive so if Lando goes out maybe finishes sixth seventh I mean there's a 17 gap between Max and Nika Holcomberg there was an opportunity there. Now, it's hard to quantify that in terms of how many points he lost,

but I still see that as a point loss. Yeah, definitely. It's a very good point. I think there's many points lost here. There are ones that I think, and a lot of people make the joke of like if and, you know, because it's all kind of, yeah, exactly, it's all subjective.

You know, you can say, I can look at this championship, and think that Lando should have got a lot more race wins. But that at the end of day is just opinion, whereas those ones by McLaren where they could have switched the cars, that is literal factual points. That makes no difference to their Constructors' Championship. That is what they could have achieved through just a radio call.

But if we are talking about, yeah, other points left on the table, I think Austria is a big one. I would argue that Austria is similarly a fact. actual thing anyway, right? We're not talking about the incident, the crash, the damage. I'm talking about Lando coming into the pits and carrying on the race. There are points lost there. I'm very surprised.

I never really thought about that at the time, but he was driving back to the pits with, yeah, it didn't look like he'd absolutely ruined his car. There was talk of him, you know, driving back too quickly in the first place, probably out of frustration where, you know, you need to, you know, Max took it a lot slower and protected his car to be. able to get more points. But yeah, I always have seen Austria from the perspective that Lando should simply have just got past Max.

He had a much better car. I know Max was doing his, what many people find questionable driving and taking it to the absolute limit. But there was so many opportunities that, you know, it was lap after lap that he was having that run on him. And it was a different thing each time. And it was an amazing opportunity. But, yeah, I've never really seen it from that perspective.

That there was points left on the table there as well, that they just completely just sacked in the whole weekend. You know, that for me, yeah. Because you just think of, and we're getting into like if territory again, but those 10 points that we just mentioned about McLaren swapping the cars, add a few more there you know we're getting into like 30 points which is almost like a win so um it's definitely uh you know they've left so much on the table i think one thing i would throw into the mix if we're now talking about like what should have been was silverstone i can't believe

that wasn't a easy mcclaren won two um you know piastri should have even won that race himself uh they finished third and fourth uh so Yeah, it was a very odd one. How they finished behind Max Verstappen that day is beyond me. It's mental, yeah. Now, I think testament to Max, that was a 10 out of 10 stone cold perfect drive from Max in that car. But wow. I mean, it was an amazing race.

There were so many changeable factors. But yeah, that was a big old blunder, I think, for McLaren there. And if anything, you look at that and you go, well, if McLaren had treated Austin, correctly because I think McLaren screwed over Oscar more than anyone in that race, to be honest with you. Oh yeah, big time. Yeah. If he had won that race,

Oscar's in the championship. In this conversation just with this one sort of switch around. So, yeah, I know we're, again, this is all scenario based, but that's the whole fun of this podcast. I think that what else are we going to throw in there? Azerbaijan is obviously a talking point because of the qualifying blunder. now there was of course factors there that I understand and appreciate made things confusing for Lando and it was more of an FIA issue the fact that they even threw a yellow flag for a car that wasn't

stopped but it's a huge amount of points lost of course he finished fourth but he had great pace and Oscar won the race by by 10 seconds so again this is this is where you kind of get more into the unlucky territory, but then you also need to speak about perhaps where Max lost points as well. This isn't just a perfect. No one's going to have a perfect season. No, they're not. If Ferrari has, Charlotte has leading the world championship, you know what I'm saying? But this is, you have to be careful here, don't you? Oh, well, if this, this happened, this happened, this happened, this happened, this happened, then they'll be leading the championship. But the more controllable factors is where we're more sort of honing in on today. Yeah, definitely. I think the controllable factors,

100% are those are your Hungary for example, like you say and Austria and those, there are other races I think Lando's left what should have been a better result but they're a bit more kind of

getting bad starts. Yeah, if he gets a good start but he didn't and I think that's more more of the point, right? But perhaps he's got that duck off of his back now after Singapore. So I think it's interesting. Let's go to a question, actually. P1 Patreon member, TVR driver. How long before McLaren regret not issuing team orders?

So I would say they will regret not issuing team orders when we get to Abu Dhabi and Lando Norris is more than seven points behind Max Verstappen, and therefore it's not in their own hands as to whether they win the title or not. or 32 points where it means that it doesn't. Yeah, yeah, but it literally puts you in that last race. I think if it did get to 30 points as an example, I think that the media would jump on that. You know, if it gets to 30 points,

the gap is 30 points after Qatar. And yes, it is an extreme scenario, but Max has had a DNF, this year. Lando's in a very quick race-winning car. It's not impossible for it to happen. And yes, it would be a long shot, but there would be that talk of, well, you know, he'd have had a chance in Abu Dhabi if you'd just switch the cars in Hungary. So that will come into it. But I think it really does just come down to, in a weird way, McLaren almost need to either win the championship or come nowhere near it to save their blushes, because it's,

It could be embarrassing for them if it is a handful of points. The way I see it is if they don't win the driver's championship by one or two points or three points, I guess it depends how many wins both of them will have by the end. Let's say one or two points. I will categorically say McLaren through that championship because they should have swapped Oscar and Lando second and third place. Hungary is a more difficult one. McLaren put themselves in that position, but I think they did the right decision in the sense. of after they put themselves in it, they then had to stick with that.

Yeah, yeah. Right. And it was also, it was July, I think we need to remember as well. Like we look back at it now. Yeah, it did. I think we were still, however much we look back on it now and think it was silly, in July, I think we were still very much of like, well, at least we're having great races, but Max has got this title one.

Whereas now it's like, oh, my word. Red Bull's form are, you know, someone's got an opportunity here to take this because, like we said, Max's form being fifth, second, fifth, fourth second, sixth second, sixth second, sixth second, fifth second is not championship winning form. Speaking of Max Verstappen, shall we discuss where we think the biggest dropped points have been for Max and Red Bull and seeing as you are literally wearing a Max top and you are a Maxx top and you are a Maxxapan fanboy and know his entire history and law off the top of your head. where would you put his biggest points losses? I'd say lap 32, no. It's surely a weird one that you never really think about. It could end up crucial is Australia, because that was a max win in the bag, really.

It was completely dominant, started on pole, won the first two races comfortably. It was like, okay, you know, this was when we were locked in of he can't win every race. And when he had that DNF, the kind of narrative around it was, oh, well, you know, he's going to win the title easily anyway. Look how good the car is. And then he won the next two. And he didn't really think anything of that.

But you look at that now and you can flip it the other way and go, well, that's 25 points that Max should have got. and if he gets them points, we'd probably not be having the same debate of as this title on because it would be 75 with 6 to go, and then Lando needs almost three DNFs really. So, yeah, that one could end up being more crucial than we thought at the time. Absolutely. Weird to think all the way back to Australia as one of those,

moments that could have been pivotal for the championship and we're starting to go, is Max going going to win every single Grand Prix this year? I would also, I guess it's worth mentioning Miami, where he got unlucky with the safety car. But again, that's more unlucky than anything else. I mean, he had a reliability issue, didn't he, Max, in Australia. Has Lando had any reliability issues this year? No. It's not at one, is it? No.

The only kind of non-finishes, if you like, for him were obviously Austria, which was the collision with Max. And then in the Miami sprint, he also got taken out the start, didn't he, when he had quite a bad qualifying. So they're the only times he's retired to. He's not had like a failure, like an engine failure or anything that's halted his shot. I mean, I'm doing this off the top of my head.

I'm pretty, was Oscar dropping in Miami? He was actually in a really good form, Oscar at Miami, and he dropped out, I think he got a punctured in he with science. Yeah, he did, yeah. So McLaren have had bullet-proof reliability. Well, McLaren fans are going to be really happy. We've just said that out loud. But it's, yeah, I know Formula One, they are a lot more reliable now,

but, uh, I think, are they the only team that haven't had a retirement? Because, yeah, they will be, surely. Yeah, they are. Because I guess Lando's technically classified for Austria. Because it was so towards the end of the race. So, yeah, McLaren, the only team without a DNF. Damn.

Well, let's hope it stays that way for our sakes after saying that out loud, Tommy. Apart from that, any other moments for Max? He's very good at. one with, it's a difficult one with Max because, I guess with Lando, and sometimes people are unfair on him, but you look at the results that Lando's kind of not got, and maybe there's a bit of bias there because Perez is so,

his form has been so bad. But when Lando doesn't have a good race, that we're always kind of like, oh, well, you know, you should be winning. that race because the McLaren's amazing. Whereas Max's drop off very much kind of been like, well, the car has now been completely abysmal. It's a really good point, actually, isn't it?

Because you've got Max and Perez, Max constantly beats Perez by a similar margin, whereas when Lando has a bad race, Oscar wins or is on the podium and you go, well, that is proof that Lando should have been up there. So I guess that's maybe where the difference lies. Yeah, very true. In fact, I was going to say this for the end, but I'll do it now as soon as you've mentioned it. And we're kind of on the subject because I think it's a very interesting thing of kind of should Lando be leading this championship,

we can speak about ifs and buts and all that kind of stuff. But when you look at Norris and Piastri and how their performance is, so you look at Perez, we always know that Max, whether another driver could do a better job than Max, we don't know. But factually, you can see that when Oscar wins a race, you can say, well, Ando should have won that race. So what I did, because I'm a massive nerd,

is I did some maths, and I worked out the entire championship if you basically take the best result from every Red Bull and the best result from everyone McLaren because that's the only way we can know categorically that's where the car could be and the championship no surprise changes

very little on Max's side so 331 points becomes 341 points because the only time was when Paris finished the Australian Grand Prix so 341 points is like the maximum Red Bull

McLaro 347 so six points ahead so you've got you've got to say they have had the car to to be and people will be at Lando you know it's piastri as well like the two the two of them sort of fluctuating and sometimes winning sometimes finishing forth both of them have kind of had those moments so McLaren have had a car that can wit that can be not not only win this title, but be leading this title already. I guess my one thing with that maths that you've done is that technically the 10 points that Perez is bringing home for Australia, Max should have had 25 in that race.

So I guess you could say that because McLaren have had bulletproof reliability that Red Bull. But even if you add that, like the gap is what like five or six points? Yeah, but they're right up there. Still be just about ahead. Yeah, exactly. So it's very close. There's no doubt they should be a lot closer. you know if we're going to get into the ifs and buts now

have we not been doing that for the last 20s? Yeah exactly well we did we did the ones that are you know that were like more more factual but yeah that there are so many races there where you kind of feel like Lando or Oscar should have won and got more points Silverstone Belgium you know Belgium they both qualified really poorly and I guess the key thing for Max as well to throw into the mix

is that, which is difficult for Lando is every time Lando's had that brilliant drive and done a really good job and won the race, Max has been second. He's not had that enormous point swing yet where, you know, when Max was finishing sixth and fifth and whatever, Lando's finished second or fourth or fifth himself, we've not had that. I think that is where, if that did happen, so we get to Austin,

Lando wins, Max is sixth or seventh and they're still struggling. Oh yeah, you will literally ball your eyes out. I will literally, I will be pooping my pants. You're finished. No, you're absolutely finished. If Max finished is sick, then Austin and Lando wins, you're done. You're absolutely finished. Charles finished in second at least as well.

Like Max is, yeah, they're basically going to Salba next year. Okay, interesting. Well, look, there's a lot of scenarios here, but I've thoroughly enjoyed kind of going through this all. I suppose the last question we can come. kind of go into from P1 patron member Savage Monkey 3.0, how much will Lando and McLaren learn from this year if they lose the driver's championship? I hope they learn a lot if they don't win the driver's championship.

But the thing that doesn't change is that Lando and Oscar are still in the same team. I believe, if anything, next year will be even worse when it comes to making decisions between those two drivers, because I genuinely think they will both be number one. I can't see McLaren being able to sort this dilemma out. Oscar's getting better and better. He's going to be much more on the pace, in my opinion, of Lando consistently throughout next year.

So what do McLaren do? They can't, they're going to have to let them literally do whatever they want for the first two-thirds of the season. But what I'd hope that they will come to an agreement and an understanding of at the start of next year is if there's a scenario where one of you can win the driver's championship mathematically. And it doesn't matter if the second one can also mathematically win 50 points behind the other one, we have to back one driver. It's as simple as that. It is Formula 1, 101. Just look at the last 70 years of this championship and how many times this has happened with 10.

teams working towards one driver winning the driver's championship. McLaren themselves, Ferrari, every team that have won Drivers World Championships do this. So that's what they, they don't need to learn it. They just need to remember. They just need to remember what they used to be like. It is really, that's a really funny scenario because I think I have said on this podcast many, many times, funnily enough, not about McLaren. It was actually about Mercedes, wasn't it?

where I said that I think that even if Mercedes got a great card to challenge for the championship, the problem is that when Hamilton had Bottas, it was very much like most of the time he took maximum points like Max is doing now. But Russell and Hamilton have taken points off each other and sometimes one of them is better than the other and they're quite close. this is exactly what's happening with Norris and Piastri that you know like I said earlier you give the best result to the same driver every week and what it what it can do they're higher in the championship but you don't want to do that and I feel like next year it could be even worse because oscar's level of improvement you know they get a good car at the start of the year they're both going to be winning races and

then how far into the season do you get before you before you basically confirm because like you say it they are mathematically in there and there'll be loads of contract debates and all sorts of things like that so it's the weird

it's the weird way Formula One works where when you're on the back foot and you're trying to push for a Constructors Championship or whatever, two best drivers, it's great in that scenario. They're going to win the constructors. But the drivers is where it gets more tricky because someone like Maxostappen, is that been absolutely loving it that Oscar Piastri is winning races and stuff

because it eases the pressure from Lando. So, yes, it's going to be very, very spicy between those two in the future, I think. Oh, it is. Yeah, I see it unfolding in a very dramatic, manner in the coming years. So I guess to sum up, how I would say is should, I guess it's not McLaren leading by a championship, should Landon and OSB

leading the driver's championship from a McLaren blunder situation and those only, so the ones that are controllable, no, Lando should not be leading the Drivers World Championship. Should he be closer? Yes. If we're combining ifs, buts and maybes and pace with McLaren decisions, should they be leading the

championship? Yes. That's how I see. Yeah, completely agree. I think the key thing is that we'll get to the end of the season, regardless of what happens in these final six races, we will get to the end of the season, and my opinion won't change that McLaren have delivered a car that can win the Drivers World Championship. And it's now just a case of whether they will or not.

We'll find out. Absolutely, we will find out. Six races to go. I'm so ready. cannot wait to see how this unfolds. Tommy, what are your final thoughts, please? My final thoughts are, as a Formula One fan, carry it on as a Max de Stauffin fan.

Red Bull, please fix that car, because if you turn up to Austin and you're still terrible, I'm going to be a shaky mess for the fight. Oh, gosh, the Twitch watch longs are going to be so good, even if Charles is not even challenging for it. I'm going to still relish in you actually going through some sort of F1 stress, because you've had it far too easy. I thought you were also going to mention the penguins.

Oh, my front door's just gone. You do the penguin thing and I'll go do my front door. As Matt answers his door, which I don't think is penguins, if you remember the last episode, we were talking about penguins and how someone from the Antarctic, basically message in that listens to our podcast while looking after penguins. I had a message from someone called Wendy who said, Hi Tommy.

Thought you and Matt would like to know that when I was listening to the podcast when you're talking about the penguin thing, it was during a penguin rescue in the middle of the Mabib Desert. So penguin enjoyers just love this podcast. I think we need to get some more demographics on YouTube of how many penguins listen to our podcast now at this point. Any other penguin enthusiasts, please keep them coming in. Or any other animal enthusiasts, if you work in a zoo, just get those messages in. We love to read them to find that way you listen from. We will read out the most bizarre listening scenarios because we love to hear it.

I can't comprehend it, to be honest. No, me neither. Our voices are in very different places in the world. Okay, that is it. Thank you, everybody. We'll see you very soon. Lots of love. Take care.

Keep pushing with the penguins. And goodbye. Just pictured someone doing. like reps of the penguin that keep pushing me the penguin that's one way of combining

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