McLaren focusing on 2020 over Renault battle

McLaren

McLaren focusing on 2020 over Renault battle

Can they reach the top three next year?

Matthew Scott

Tuesday 17 September 2019 10:00

McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl says the team will focus more on getting its 2020 car ready than the fight for fourth place in the constructors' standings over the last few races of the season.

After many years of struggle, McLaren's long-promised revival has seemingly begun in 2019, scoring points in 10 of the 14 races so far to lead the midfield fight, while Carlos Sainz also holds 'best of the rest' status in the drivers' championship.

Renault cut McLaren's lead in fourth to 18 point with a fourth/fifth-place finish in Italy last time out, but Seidl says his team cannot afford to take focus away from 2020 as they try to cut the gap to the big three, something Renault had vowed to do this year.

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"We plan to bring parts, not huge updates, just small parts to the next two or three races at least, then we need to see when we switch fully onto next year's car on the development side," Seidl said.

"It's something which is open. We want to fight for this P4 position for as long as possible, but for me, it's important to make the next step with next year's car.

"So I don't want to compromise next year by suddenly switching the focus onto this year again. We have a plan in place for what we want to do this year and we have a plan in place for how we want to approach next year."

Seidl is unsure if McLaren can count on upcoming circuits to suit their car, having found consistency difficult to come across all year.

"We've seen for example, at Budapest we expected to struggle more, we were suddenly the fourth fastest car," Seidl said. "So it's difficult to judge, to be honest.

"But with all the updates we have brought to the more normal downforce package before the break, and also with the updates we will bring, we hopefully can keep up the fight for P4 until the end of the season."