Andrea Stella reveals plans for McLaren after being appointed team principal

As he outlines his goals for the future of McLaren, Andrea Stella says he wants a “continuation” of what has come before. Stella was appointed as the new team principal of McLaren after Andreas Seidl left to take over the recently vacant position of CEO at Sauber. This was the culmination of a domino-like tumbling of team principals. Stella has been a part of the McLaren team for a long time; he worked for Ferrari for 14 years before transferring to the Woking organisation in 2015 and taking on the role after being promoted from his previous position as racing director.

After team CEO Zak Brown was informed of Seidl’s desire to resign during the current campaign, Stella emerged as Brown’s top choice for the position, indicating that what comes next for the illustrious function will be an evolution rather than a revolution. Stella reaffirmed this, stating that Seidl’s work since being appointed to the position in 2019 would be continued.

“In terms of how we continue for the future,” Stella told select media. “There’s clearly elements of continuation. I think we worked very well with Andreas. We established some very important directions and we do want to consolidate them. At the same time, the complexity of Formula 1 leaves the business always open for opportunities.”

“It’s day one [in the] job for me, but this is what I’m thinking about intensively and what I will be thinking about together with my leaders at McLaren so that we can find the further opportunities to go even faster towards achieving our mission.”

Stella elaborated on some of the changes he would like to see and singled out the team’s aerodynamics division as an area that could use improvement. “In terms of of areas of opportunities, I think, where we definitely would like to make a step forward is delivering a quick car,” the 51-year-old said.

“Some of the reasons why we haven’t been able to do that so far. We know that they are quite structural, and there’s really good action and investments going on at McLaren so that we can overcome these limitations. We have important infrastructure coming to fruition in 2023 like the wind tunnel, the new simulator, and I think completing this business is certainly one of my priorities.”

“At the same time, we want to make some areas of the team stronger. We know enough about Formula 1 [so that] we know it is fundamentally an aerodynamic game. So no surprise that one of the areas we want to get stronger is on the aerodynamic side. I think we have incredible talent, possibly we need to expand manpower in that area, and that’s also one of the projects that are ongoing which will certainly grant continuity.”