McLaren hopes to bounce back in Monaco

McLaren has set the goal of avoiding a repeat of the difficult Miami Grand Prix after the team experienced one of its toughest races of the 2023 Formula 1 season. After falling far short of its objectives in the first four races of the season, the team has placed high hopes on the improvements to come throughout the season.

The team showed signs of improvement during the Azerbaijan GP, but were brought back down to earth with a rhythmless weekend in Miami. Their ranking (17th and 19th) was not made easier by technical issues and damages that occurred during the race.

During the traditional Thursday press conference, Oscar Piastri indicated that the performance issues of the MCL60 were due to the high temperatures in Miami: “I also think that it is supposed to be much colder than in Miami, which, in our opinion, was also part of our problem.” Piastri hopes that the specificity of the Monaco circuit will allow them to be more competitive: “It is evident that the circuit is very different from Miami, so we hope that it will suit us a little better. That being said, we also need to address our weaknesses in other areas.”

Lando Norris, whose future is sometimes subject to speculation due to McLaren’s lack of competitiveness, is optimistic about the team’s ability to hide some of its drawbacks, particularly its lack of top speed: « We are terrible on the straight lines, luckily there aren’t many here. But we are also not very good in the corners, and there are plenty of them here! It’s a circuit where we have achieved good results in the past, even in times when we didn’t expect it to be so. Fifth last year and third the previous year, so we are probably a little more competitive here than in other places. »