McLaren "don't like it" but no protest against Racing Point 'Pink Mercedes'

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McLaren "don't like it" but no protest against Racing Point 'Pink Mercedes'

The RP20 has caused controversy since it was unveiled in pre-season testing

Sam Hall

Friday 3 July 2020 10:58 Updated: 11:18

McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl has confirmed his Formula 1 team will not be protesting the Racing Point RP20 - a car dubbed the 'Pink Mercedes'.

When Racing Point rolled out its 2020 challenger at Barcelona for pre-season testing many were quick to point out the similarities between it and the 2019 title-winning Mercedes.

The team acknowledged this and admitted to designing its car using photos of the W10.

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Talks of protests against the design grew rapidly, but McLaren has now firmly distanced itself from such actions, despite Seidl openly saying he is not a fan of this method of working.

“McLaren, we can only speak for ourselves, and we have announced there is absolutely no intention to launch any protest, because I think also there are no grounds for that," Seidl told a media conference call including GPFans on Friday.

"Mercedes and Racing Point have chosen to go down this route which, to be honest, I think there is room in the regulations to do what they did.

“Do I like it? Of course, I don’t like it, but at the same time, if it’s possible in the regulations to do something like that, to have this kind of co-operation in terms of sharing wind tunnel technology and so on, there’s no reason to complain.

“I simply think it’s important for Formula 1, without further clarifications towards the future, to make sure that there’s a certain limitation of what you can do.”

Aside from believing that protesting the RP20 would be a frivolous task, Seidl also sees it as a waste of resources and would prefer to see his team's focus inwards.

He added: “In the end, I prefer to focus on ourselves.

“We know exactly what we have to do on our side, on McLaren’s side, in order to make the next steps, and that’s where I use my energy together with the team.”

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