Abu Dhabi: McLaren Formula 1 executive director Zak Brown is confident that his two Renault-powered cars piloted by two-time Champion Fernando Alonso and Stoddel Vandoorne will be able to erase the dark memories of their three-year disappointing stint with Honda engines, in 2018.
Brown accepted that McLaren opted for the Renault power to put them back where they belong and give them a chance to fight for the podium.
“Well, that’s certainly our goal. We’re very confident in the Renault engine. They’ve got a great history in the sport and won half the championships in the last 10-15 years,” said Brown, who also asserted that he would however need a complete package to get the desired result.
“The drivers, the team, the chassis, the power unit and we’re up for it. We’re excited and we’re well prepared. We think we have the tools that we need, so podiums are what we are going to be going for, whether that’s the third, second or first step — hopefully it’s a combination of all the above.
To return to the podium, his two drivers will be the key and Brown will be backing his old war horse Alonso to pull them out of the rut. Brown has been maintaining that Alonso never pushed McLaren for a change of engines or he would leave, but now that the cars are competitive, the 36-year-old will have a point to prove.
Alonso has been trying his hand in various car series as well; giving tests in WEC and also in Daytona 24 hours and Brown has been backing him all the way.
“Well, he’s a true racer. I wasn’t at his test in Bahrain so I’ve only spoken to him briefly about it. I think he found the way the cars, with their energy systems and the recovery work, are fascinating.
“I was at the test in LMP2 and as you would expect he was awesome, very focused and what we saw was the least amount of fall-off over a run that we’ve seen of any racing driver in our cars. So he is definitely on the top of his game right now.”
No ‘shark fins’ for 2018
Formula One cars are also set to lose their prominent engine cover ‘shark fins’ next season after McLaren failed to back other teams hoping to retain them.
As per Red Bull team boss Christian Horner, earlier in the year they all agreed that they were going to leave the fin as it was and stick the number there. Horner blamed Brown for the change of heart as the latter wanted his car’s rear wing to be more visible for commercial gains.
“In usual fashion, we left the meeting and things changed. He’s (Brown) obviously signed a major sponsor for next year that he’s trying to get as much coverage as he can for, so McLaren presented another variant,” said Horner adding that ‘problem is the aerodynamicists’ then looked at it and said ‘well that screws up the rear wing so we don’t want that.’ So I’m not quite sure as we sit here what we’ve got. I think it goes back to what’s in the regulation, which is no fin.”
Brown stood his ground on the issue saying, “Well, the rear wing is the very valuable spot on the race car. With the current engine fin with the tight, blocks the rear wing.
“If you look at today’s race car, front wings are no longer commercially viable. We’ve got bargeboards and aerodynamic devices blocking the chassis side and now we’ve got this big engine fin that blocks the rear wing, so that was really more of a case of starting to free up some commercial locations on the race car.”
