Explained: The expected impact from McLaren’s upgraded F1 front wing

McLaren have explained the upgra🅺des they have introduced at the Austrian Grand Prix.

Lando Norris (GBR) McLaren MCL38. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 11, Austrian Grand Prix, Spielberg, Austria, Sprint
Lando Norris (GBR) McLaren MCL38. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 11, Austrian Grand Prix,…

McLaren have explained the expected benefit of their upgraded front wing at the F1 Austrian Grand Prix.

The British squad was one of only a few teams to update their 2024 challenger for this weekend’s race at the Red B♒ull Ring.

McLaren hope t💙he new front wing will improve the low-speed behaviour of the MCL38 and boost their🔯 ongoing bid to challenge Red Bull.

“The focus is to keep the development direction that we introduced trackside with the front wing we took to Miami,” McLaren team prin🥂cipal Andrea Stella to𓆏ld media including in Austria. 

“We saw that that concept worked well, so we wanted to pursue further this direction, and this is another attempt to improve, in partiꦡcular, the low-speed behaviour of the car.”

McLaren are conꦓfident the up🥀dated front wing can bring low-speed gains without negatively impacting their high-speed performance.

“Especially with this generation of cars, and this generatio🍸n of front wing regulations, the geometries are very restricted,” Stella added.

“It is very difficult to achieve wha𒅌t you want at your speed - at high-speed angles for instance - or what you want in a straight line or what you want in high-speed.

“This is a challenge that I’m sure all tea🦩ms are facing and that’s also why it’s quite difficult to bring development on a front wing.

“So hopefully the compromise we are working on is capable of delivering some low-speed benefit but without affec🃏ting the high-speed or the straight lines too negatively.”

As well as the new front wing, McLaren ha൲ve also debuted new suspension fairings.

“The suspension is just the fairings, justꦓ the shrouds,” Stella explained.

“When you change the fron🐠t wing it changes slightly the flow that goes to the b🐷ack of the car and so you need to optimise the components downstream for the slight variation in the flow topology.

“This is very nꦆormal, I think I see more and more when teams bring a front wing upgrade they also then upgrade brake ducts and suspension shrouds. That’s purely aerodynamics.” 

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