McLaren warned excuses expire in 2024

McLaren

McLaren warned excuses expire in 2024

McLaren has climbed the constructors' standings in recent years

Sam Hall

Friday 23 July 2021 08:00

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McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown has warned that McLaren's excuses for not being in F1 title contention will expire in 2024 after it designs its first car with the aid of a new wind tunnel.

After securing funding last December that has helped guarantee its future, McLaren has focused on improving its infrastructure to match the standards of championship rivals Mercedes and Red Bull.

A new wind tunnel is scheduled to open in 2022, the results of which are likely to only bear fruit in 2024, the year Brown is expecting to see a title challenge.

"It is always dangerous to pick a point in time in which you should be going for it," said Brown.

"But what I would say is we will have caught up by 2024 with all of our infrastructure, most specifically the wind tunnel.

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“Unfortunately, we are in one of the less technically developed wind tunnels and that is a huge disadvantage, so I think we will have no excuses come the 2024 season.

"I would like to think at that point the sport is going to be so competitive that there will be a variety of teams fighting for the championship. I would like to think we will be one of them.”

Aston Martin needs "a world championship driver"

Last year, Racing Point - now Aston Martin - was one of McLaren's key adversaries in 'the fight for third' that also included Renault.

Aston Martin owner Lawrence Stroll has stated it will take a period of four to six years for his team to become F1 champions.

Whilst Brown does not doubt the Canadian billionaire's ambitions, he feels the final piece of the jigsaw will be finding a driver capable of delivering the results at that point.

Brown is far from being disrespectful to Sebastian Vettel, who will be 38 in four years' time.

Brown explained: “I don’t know everything that they’ve got going on so it would be hard for me to comment on whether they can achieve it.

"He [Stroll] certainly seems to be very committed to his commentary about wanting wind tunnels and what he is spending.

“To win a world championship, you’re going to need a world championship driver in four to six years.

“But speaking about ourselves, we’re definitely in that timeline."