The team's drop to fifth place in the constructors' championship in 2022, according to McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown, was a "disappointing" outcome.
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In a competitive battle between the two teams for fourth place, Alpine emerged victorious. Lando Norris of McLaren outperformed Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso, but Daniel Ricciardo was unable to surpass either Alpine driver and finished the season much behind his teammate. Midway through the year, McLaren announced that Ricciardo will not complete his contract’s last year in 2023. After the season, team president Andreas Seidl left the organisation to join Sauber in preparation for the change to Audi.
Brown acknowledged that he was unhappy with McLaren’s season-ending performance. He admitted to Speedcafe that the season “[was] tough, for sure.” “Fifth place is frustrating after finishing fourth and third before that. “We faced difficulties. We undoubtedly had some successful weekends, with Lando taking the podium. Then, of course, we had a lot of trouble understanding Daniel so that we could get the most out of him. As a result, as you are all too aware, the media coverage of that during the entire season was unpleasant.
To fill in for Ricciardo the following year, McLaren enticed Oscar Piastri away from Alpine, where he was a reserve driver. Brown stated, “We’re super-excited to have landed another Australian in Oscar – and that wasn’t without a little bit of arm wrestling and drama. So, yes, a difficult year.
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According to Brown, the team’s constructors championship goal for 2023 is to finish fourth. They also want to close the performance gap between themselves and the leading vehicles. Given how well-rounded a team Mercedes is and the fact that we share an engine, Brown said, “We have two data points that we pay most attention to: one is how close we are to the team that is winning and, if that team is not Mercedes, our second data point is how close we are to Mercedes.” “Those are therefore our two main competitive data points, and we want to be closer to them in the coming year than we were this one. It’s challenging to assign a precise number after that. Naturally, we’d like to get back up to fourth place in the championship. To actually be able to enter the top three, I believe we’ll need a little bit more of our technologies in place.
