Back to Spa, one year later
Last year Lando Norris took pole position, and then the GP was won by teammate Oscar Piastri bringing home the penultimate double of McLaren history in Formula 1 (the last came a week later, in Budapest). Twelve months later, the level of expectations could not be more different, with the Woking team no longer leading the Drivers and Constructors standings and indeed, with the switch to the new generation cars, struggling as the fourth or at best third force on track. A prediction that, however, at Spa, the team led by Andrea Stella hopes to overturn with the arrival of a novelty long awaited for several GPs and so far always postponed.
Read more Cal Crutchlow confirmed for the British GP in place of Zarco
The most awaited novelty: the Macarena wing is here
It is obviously the inverted rear wing, now almost unanimously called “Macarena” in the paddock, after the Ferrari team principal, Frederic Vasseur, called it that during the pre-season tests in Bahrain. A component that, in fact, should help on the straight when the wing flaps open, and that could prove even more advantageous on a circuit like Spa-Francorchamps, where the “Straightline Mode” zones are five in number (as had not happened since the inaugural GP in Melbourne) as well as particularly long and decisive for lap time. The papaya team would thus become the third this season to exploit the regulatory insight had at the beginning of the year by the engineers of Maranello and which engineer Rob Marshall admitted to having observed with great curiosity.
Add FormulaPassion to your Favorite Sources on Google
The arrival of the long-awaited novelty is announced by the technical director of applied engineering of the McLaren F1 team, Neil Houlding: “Our preparation has been meticulous and we have relied on extensive simulation work to anticipate what we know will be a very challenging weekend from an energy management point of view. We arrive at Spa with a new rear wing specification, an upgrade that we had planned as part of the development path. We are confident that this upgrade will add some performance to our car, but we are fully aware that, after a difficult GP at Silverstone this weekend will not be so easy either, so we do not expect big changes in terms of competitiveness”.
Macarena McLaren: a bumpy road
So, the intention is really to finally debut the much-discussed – and now also closely watched by the FIA, considering the recent incidents involving Max Verstappen’s Red Bull – “Macarena” type rear wing on the MCL40, which involves the rotation and inversion of the movable flap to increase the gap between the surfaces and further reduce drag. A component that, however, has had a troubled gestation: already brought to the track in Austria, then McLaren decided to postpone the debut of the new wing to Silverstone only to decide not to take risks given the sprint format of the weekend, further postponing the real debut to the first practice sessions at Spa. Will this be the right time?
Read more Bearman does the rain dance at Spa: “It could be an opportunity to fight for points”
