“We also have to be realistic; we are in this fight still because of other people’s failures, not because – if you look at the whole of the season – what we did.”
Max Verstappen’s words on Thursday night seem all the more poignant in the aftermath of a Qatar Grand Prix that saw him beat both McLaren drivers to victory – or more accurately, McLaren beat itself.
The race was there for the taking for Oscar Piastri’s side of the garage. A good start from pole position and no major threat from Verstappen behind, despite the Dutchman jumping Lando Norris off the line to take second place. The Red Bull was not expected to have the race pace to overhaul a McLaren, particularly on a track so tough to overtake on.
But when Nico Hulkenberg and Pierre Gasly tangled on the start of lap seven and the safety car was deployed, McLaren didn’t just leave the door unlocked, it pushed it wide open and waved Verstappen through.
Every single car that was still in the race came into the pits during that safety car period. Every single car except for a McLaren, that is.
“That’s an interesting move,” Verstappen thought to himself in the Red Bull cockpit.
“I asked, ‘What are we doing?’” Piastri said. “Because we were getting pretty close to the pit entry and I hadn’t had a call yet.
“When you don’t get a call instantly when the safety car comes out, clearly there’s probably some discussions going on about what to do. In that situation, you have to trust the team because they have a lot more information than the driver in the car on where gaps are and stuff like that. In that scenario I have to trust what the team decide.
“When I got told that everyone has pitted except for me, Lando and [Esteban] Ocon, and then Ocon pitted the next lap, I knew we were in some trouble.”
Some trouble could be seen as an understatement. McLaren failed to take advantage of a cheap pit stop, left itself vulnerable to pitting into traffic with a huge margin to try and make up in race pace, and handed Verstappen a clear run at victory.
“Speechless … I don’t have any words,” Piastri said on team radio afterwards.
Fortunately, team principal Andrea Stella is rarely lost for words, and offered an explanation into what McLaren was thinking at the time.
“Effectively, we have conceded one pit stop to a rival that was fast today, so obviously we did it for a reason,” Stella said. “The reason was that we didn’t want to end up in traffic after the pit stop, but obviously all the other cars and teams had a different opinion in relation to a safety car at lap seven. Everyone pitted, and this made our staying out ultimately be incorrect from a race outcome point of view.
“Because Verstappen was fast, and also because the tire degradation was low, ultimately this decision was significantly penalizing because clearly Oscar was in control of the race and deserved to win it, and we lost the podium as well.”
The one time – one single time – an empty pitlane spells disaster, McLaren manage to take full disadvantage. Peter Fox/Getty Images
Norris was philosophical as he saw his race limited to fourth place, realistically only losing one position – and with it three points – from where he was running before the pit stop decision. Given he was set to lose 10 points to Piastri at that stage, his lead looked set to be 12 either way.
But Piastri saw a win get away that would have strengthened his own title hopes after a run of difficult form, and admitted the frustration was “pretty high” after only closing the gap to 16 points.
“And that’s saying quite a lot given the last few races I’ve had!” he said. “Clearly we didn’t get it right today, which is a shame because the whole weekend went very, very well. We had a lot of pace. I felt like I drove well, so yeah, it’s pretty painful.”
The Qatar error comes straight after both McLarens were disqualified from the Las Vegas Grand Prix, opening the door for Verstappen to cut a 42-point deficit in the title fight to 24 points. He’s since halved it again, but Stella insists the recent failings can be seen as growing pains for McLaren if it can learn from its mistakes and get over the line with one of its drivers in Abu Dhabi.
“I think in terms of the misjudgment it’s something that we will have to review, discussing internally,” Stella said. “We will have to assess some factors like, for instance, whether there was a certain bias in the way we were thinking that led us as a group to think that not all cars necessarily would pit.
“There are sometimes some objective reasons and sometimes there may be some biases in the way you think. We will have to go through the review in a very thorough way, but what’s important is that we do it as usual in a way that is constructive, and is analytical.
“I think already after Vegas we have had the possibility for me – and I was very proud of the team – to see how strong the no-blame culture is at McLaren, how much our culture is a culture of progress, is a culture of continuous improvements.
“Racing is tough, racing may give you tough lessons, but this is the history of champions. I worked with Michael Schumacher; we won several titles together. We all think about the titles now, but after Vegas I was thinking how much pain he had to go through, for instance, when Michael started his experience at Ferrari. This is just the history of Formula 1; this is the true nature of racing.
“We are disappointed, but … as soon as we start the review we will get even more determined to learn from our lessons, adapt, and be stronger as a team – [to] make sure that this phenomenal, beautiful opportunity that we have to compete for the drivers’ championship and be the ones that actually stop Verstappen’s dominance in this period of Formula 1 – we want to face it at the best of ourselves.
“I’m looking forward to the next race and I’m looking forward to seeing a strong reaction from our team.”
The reaction will need to be strong, because Verstappen and Red Bull have taken advantage of almost every opening McLaren left in the second half of this season, and could snatch away a title that would be as much about McLaren losing it as it would be Verstappen winning it.
