Will McLaren survive their Honda contract?
Discussion
They must simply be hemorrhaging money at the moment, they will not be mid field competitive this year, nor next.
They have no title sponsor, and little hope of attracting one.
But most worrying of all is this weekend Honda have showed clearly how much they under estimate what is required. On a par with Ferrari?? What on earth was he thinking they still appear to be some considerable distance behind Renault to my eyes, even after their "substantial" step this w/e.
When this sorry mess comes to a sticky and acrimonious ens (as it surely will) where will they then go for an engine supply?
I sincerely hope it doesn't, being something of a fan, but I suspect the Honda deal will end the F1 team.
They have no title sponsor, and little hope of attracting one.
But most worrying of all is this weekend Honda have showed clearly how much they under estimate what is required. On a par with Ferrari?? What on earth was he thinking they still appear to be some considerable distance behind Renault to my eyes, even after their "substantial" step this w/e.
When this sorry mess comes to a sticky and acrimonious ens (as it surely will) where will they then go for an engine supply?
I sincerely hope it doesn't, being something of a fan, but I suspect the Honda deal will end the F1 team.
road hog said:
what about the Mclaren Peugeot , pairing ,that didnt go to well either.. ??
True, but that deal came on the back of a stunningly successful few years with Honda when Mclaren were considered (one of) the top team(s).Currently, they're the team ahead of Manor, with ten times the budget.
cjm said:
I agree, lots of people seem to be saying ti's a great chassis just waiting for the engine to deliver, it must be easy for the chassis to feel good when you are way down on power and as you say they haven't done anything special in the last few years.
Actually no, it needs the downforce (it was designed for) in order to make it work as it was designed, at the moment apparently (according to Jenson) they simply aren't able to apply the downforce without dramatically compromising speed.Edited by cjm on Tuesday 25th August 10:34
RGambo said:
Going back all the way to the original Mac/Honda partnership. They were most successful with the turbo engine, which WAS a great engine which went through a very painful gestation period in the back of a Williams. They then sorted the engine, Williams mopped up and then Ron pinched Honda. Once the cars went over to 3.5l Atmo engines, the Honda motor was only ever good, not great. Maclaren were producing good cars for 89'90 Honda built a big old V12, which was thirsty and heavey, at this point Williams were using Judd, then Renault. once the reggie started to get the V10 right, Williams got Newey on board and the willimas Renault was the car to beat. Honda even totally scrapped the V12 for a V10 as they saw the benefits that Renault were getting from that configuration. But their V10 was reported to be inferior to the Reggie, Senna was quite vocal about the car/engine issues. He scraped the championship in '91, mostly through Williams dropping the ball to much and Nige making a few errors. In my view the mythical mac /Honda partnership was as much down to other teams misfortunes as maclaren and Hondas brilliance.
27 years has passed and both teams have picked up where they left off, both producing sub par parts of the car, promising the earth to each other.
Where do you get this version of revisionist history from?27 years has passed and both teams have picked up where they left off, both producing sub par parts of the car, promising the earth to each other.
McLaren Honda followed the turbo MP4/4, with the V10 MP4/5 and MP4/5B
They won back to back constructor and driver championships with it in 89 and 90, so not too shabby then?
They followed in 91 with a V12 in an effort to gain more power, both Burger and Senna considered it underpowered compared with the V10. In that they felt the gains were not justified by the trade off in weight and fuel consumption, Senna in particular rode Honda throughout the season for more power.
Again they won both championships.
The reason Williams were hounding them (beating them when reliability allowed) particularly through the second half of the season was the overall package was simply much more advanced. It was an Adrian Newey masterpiece, with a paddle-shift semi auto box, hugely more advanced aero and active ride (for legal reasons called reactive ride).
revrange said:
NRS said:
Just wondering where Ron has claimed it is second best? Don't think I have seen that quote?
Sorry I slightly misquoted, but as quick as other cars, just not the Merc in corners.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjJ2_ZVBRO4
Now (clearly) we know that to be ABSOLUTELY not the case, in the clip above he states categorically that they will be much more competitive over the next few races, again totally untrue.
I don't know if he's misinformed (hard to imagine for such a well known control freak) or he's simply lying, either way it's badly harming both his and McLaren's image.
andyps said:
revrange said:
Gaz. said:
Toyota got a suspended sentence, no $100m fine or exclusion from the championship etc, and did it twice in four years. Honda were approached with the same material who told Stepney to go away.
Sorry so whats the point with honda? They were approached and said bugger off? How could they be fined for that!And it isn't as if McLaren were approached with the material, Stepney didn't drive up to Woking with a folder under his arm and say to the receptionist "I've got this, will you as Mr Dennis if he would like it" and get a yes response. The reality was somewhat different.
Whilst I accept the race team and big Ron where in the dark about all this (it was Ron after all who blew the whistle), I think it's fair to say the test team were in it up to their neck, including Alonso AND de la Rosa.
CoolHands said:
so is the question not 'will mclaren survive their honda contract?' but 'will mclaren survive?'
they are going nowhere up the grid for the foreseeable future, have no sponsorship, honda paying the bulk of the budget. An old guy at the helm who is rigidly sticking to what worked in the past. If / when honda leave f1 due to lack of success mclaren won't have a leg to stand on. I reckon they'll be bought out at some point, or end up like lotus living hand to mouth.
I'm genuinely not seeing the difference between those two, as it's being contractually tied to Honda making McLaren uncompetitive.they are going nowhere up the grid for the foreseeable future, have no sponsorship, honda paying the bulk of the budget. An old guy at the helm who is rigidly sticking to what worked in the past. If / when honda leave f1 due to lack of success mclaren won't have a leg to stand on. I reckon they'll be bought out at some point, or end up like lotus living hand to mouth.
Oh, and it's McLaren.
Dr Z said:
McLarens last year have consistently had blinding starts, easily gaining 3-4 positions by the first few corners. It would be good if they have still kept this characteristic. Williams at Silverstone '15 is nothing! 
I wonder how much of that is down to the package, and how much is down to two of the worlds best F1 drivers in the seat. Remember how Kimi would make up places last year off the line?EnglishTony said:
Will McLaren survive their Honda contract?
Yes, they survived Peugeot.
They signed to Peugeot on the back of the most successful period any F1 team had ever seen.Yes, they survived Peugeot.
They had on board the title sponsor with the deepest pockets (Philip Morris).
Associate sponsors were falling over themselves to sign up.
Do you believe the two scenarios to be directly comparable?
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