McLaren F1 chief claims Mercedes customer deal is tougher than ever

Stella, Norris, socials — Photo: © IMAGO

F1 News & Gossip

McLaren chief claims Mercedes customer deal is toughest it has ever been

Lots of positives...but some negatives too

Chris Deeley Editor

Experienced sports writer covering F1 and other motorsports since 2023

Wednesday 10 June 2026 10:59

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After the party, the hangover. McLaren were brilliant for 2025 (and much of 2024) on their way to a double world title, but the bill has very much come due in 2026.

Some of that has been down to human error - Ocsar Piastri crashing out of the Australian Grand Prix before the start, and the ill-fated decision to start the Canadian Grand Prix on intermediate tyres - but the team has also struggled with power unit issues.

There was the double DNS in China with electrical issues, while Lando Norris needed a new battery in Japan despite having had a new battery at – you guessed it – the start of the weekend. The issues arose again in Monaco, with the reigning champ having to retire from Sunday's race with a power unit issue.

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Andrea Stella has now admitted that the team's status as a 'customer team' (i.e. one which doesn't make its own power units) has put them on the back foot somewhat thanks to the reduction in time that status allows them in getting the engines and associated parts integrated.

Stella: Regulation change puts reliability issues in focus

Asked about the repeated issues by Motorsport.com, Stella explained: “Never before we felt that being a customer team has put us on the back foot. And when I say this, and I want to be clear here, to avoid any misunderstanding: it's not because you are a lower priority for [Mercedes] HPP.

“[It is] because you have less opportunities to integrate, to stay on the same timeline when it comes to addressing reliability problems or exploitation of the power unit from a performance point of view, combining the efforts when you use the facilities, and some experiments on the chassis side that you can add to a long run of the power unit when you are a works team.

“There are many reasons why reliability associated to the power unit [plays a role], or taking advantage of being a works team from a power unit point of view. I think these reliability issues have come into focus in 2026, when we had such a major technical regulation change.”

How can McLaren solve power unit reliability issues?

The good news for Piastri and Norris is that things are well underway, with Stella saying: “That great relationship [with Mercedes HPP] allows us to review item by item, learn from each item and solve it technically. But when you don't know what's coming, it's not sufficient to simply address item by item.

“You ultimately need to review the depth, the intensity and the effectiveness of the various meetings, engagement, sharing of information, processes – from factory to factory, track to track, track to factory, and so on. The review is ongoing and is, in a way, punctual in terms of looking at each item individually”, Stella explained.

“But it's also a wider review in terms of what do we have to enhance? Because in 2026, there's so much novelty, there's so many new things, and we kind of have to operate at a new level of collaboration compared to what we were doing before.

"These conversations have already started for some months now, but like everything in F1, there's always a lead time. It's not like you see the results the day after. So this is already happening and is relatively wide-ranging as a discussion.”

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F1 McLaren Andrea Stella