Will McLaren empty the sandbags???

[Knowlesy]

50 hp down, Kimis completed juist 52 laps at Australia before blowing up. Not good.

[hamsmith]

Originally posted by facco
Brazil? I guess you meant Bahreim, or why BANG in the very last race of the season?

Because Brazilis the last race of the season and thats when mclaren will get around to producing a race winning car!!!

[darcym]

simple question why would a team sandbag during a race ?

[Led ZeppF1]

Abosultely, McLaren was sandbagging. Undisputed.

[Gt_R]

Testing..sandbagging perhaps..

But race?!!

I think the car is capable of matching the Renault/Williams on pace, but the thing is that the car is struggling with reliability and hence they opted to run it in "safe mode", less power,less stressing the car etc... hence it made their car look slow too. But as the race showed..it didn't heelp Kimi

[Knowlesy]

I think the most concern is actually the handling of the car. Watching onboard at Oz it seemed to understeer on turn in and oversteer mid corner. Bloody horrible really......and it's very underpowered and very unreliable to boot. The tech team has got some serious work to do.

[strider]

I am sorry to say this, because I have been a big McLaren fan in the past, but they are unlikely to win any World Championship in the near future. It's not the drivers (obviously), it's the car and the failure of the team to respond to problems that have been apparent since it was first tested. There is no GP at Valencia!

JPM must be kicking himself and DC may be thinking that a new team might not be such a bad thing after all.

[krt917]

Well, I certainly think that they're in trouble this year. As Knowlesy has said, the handling appears to be a problem as well as the engine. In fact, didn't DC say that the car was lacking in engine power, mechanical grip, and aerodynamics? It rather begs the question as to what is good about the car!? However, I don't think JPM should be too depressed yet; McLaren will surely get better - they have strength in depth. And it's around about time for Newey to produce another masterpiece...

[f1atic]

Sorry to disagree with the "sandbagging" concept. They are in it to win races, not hide their ability to do so. Another word beginning with 's' and ending with 'ing' comes to mind - STRUGGLING!

[f1truestory]

i hate that, everytime i support something, they always do bad, so i m gonna support ferrari this season

[Dutton]

I guess they were "sandbagging" insofar as they were playing it gentle with th engine, running hartdly any practice laps followed by lower reves that potentially so.

However, me thinks, that does not account for, as Ron would put it, Mclaren's "performance deficit".

[Kicking-back]

They were 1.8 seconds off in qualifying at Melbourne. Attribute a few tenths of that to Kimi's run being compromised by the dirty track from DC, and another few tenths from being fuelled for two-stops.

They are about 1 second a lap off the pace then - mostly caused by the under powered engine.

The lack of power forced them to run less wing to compensate on the straights - which made the car worse in the corners.

They'll get it sorted but it will take a while.

[hamsmith]

Originally posted by f1truestory
i hate that, everytime i support something, they always do bad, so i m gonna support ferrari this season

wishing your luck the best.

[Smokey 6 litre]

i think i hear them preparing the MP4-17 for Malysia!

[F1Pete]

According to Autosport...Coulthard admits that his Merc engine was rev-limited. Therefore, McLaren was indeed sandbagging during the race (for reliablity).

[Adam43]

In that context it isn't sandbagging. Every team's engine was 'rev-limited'. The level of the limit is set depending on the engine's reliability. All of them could up their limits, by 100s of rpm, but it wouldn't last!

Mercedes engine might have a lower limit than the rest, but this is because it's engine isn't as good.

Anyway, funny thread title.

[Knowlesy]

I guess it just highlights the state mcLaren are in, that people think they forgot to get rid of the sandbags.

What would Ron make of this?!?

[Kicking-back]

Ron will be hurting more than anyone else about McLaren's problems.

But history shows he always leads the team back to success after a difficult spell.

[Chappelli]

Sandbagging implies that they weren't going as fast as they could have. Given that a race is not just one lap, and the purpose of limiting the engines revs was to ensure it finished said race, I wouldn't call it sandbagging. After all I'm sure they were going as fast as they thought they could (while still ensuring they'd finish the race)...