'Interesting Position For Formula 1 To Be In': McLaren Team Principal Highlights Converging Grid
F1Sunday, 03 December 2023 at 10:00
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella reacted to how the Formula One grid kept converging towards the end of the 2023 season.
Red Bull has completely dominated the 2023 season; however, the end-of-the-year statistics do not quite tell the whole story of what happened.
While people looking retrospectively at the 2023 season might only see 21 out of 22 races won by Red Bull and the numerous records broken by Max Verstappen, there was more to the season than that.
Removing Red Bull from the equation, this season might have been the closest season Formula One has ever seen. Battles for second, fourth, seventh, and ninth place were not resolved until the last lap of the final race in Abu Dhabi.
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella told the media after the race at Yas Marina Circuit he thought the battles were becoming much, much closer.
"Mercedes and Ferrari, they had a little bit more than us in the race [in Abu Dhabi]. And also, we can see that not only in the top four or five teams is very close, but now, pretty much everyone is [close]."
While Mercedes and Ferrari seemed faster than McLaren during the last two races of the season, it wasn't the case during the Sao Paulo Grand Prix or the Japanese Grand Prix.
In fact, each team, including Mercedes, McLaren, Ferrari, and Aston Martin, had its moment during the 2023 season where it was faster than the rest (excluding Red Bull).
What usually happens during an F1 race is that faster cars start escaping the slower ones, and the gaps start to form between them.
Teams usually want to take advantage of these gaps and try to pit their cars in a way that they would come out right in these gaps so they have clean air and don't get held up by slower cars. However, Stella explained McLaren could not do that in Abu Dhabi.
"In the first stint, when we were trying to find gaps, to pit basically, there were no gaps, because it was a compact group of cars, that were proceeding together."
A converging grid is generally a great sign for F1 fans as it means races become closer and much less predictable, which results in more excitement. Stella concluded:
"So that's actually a very interesting position for Formula 1 to be in. Let’s see are things will change going into next season."
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