After starting the 2024 F1 season with a car that had not yet received all the upgrades planned for the winter break, similar to the start of the 2023 championship, McLaren has pushed forward with development. Thanks to the work done throughout the year, especially with the package introduced in Miami, the MCL38 has become the benchmark car and, most importantly, has transformed into a vehicle capable of being competitive on a wide variety of tracks, demonstrating its versatility.
Engineers have gradually managed to work on three of the most problematic areas: the aero downforce generated, the issue of excessive drag on the straights, and difficulties in making the front end work at low speeds, a problem that especially penalized performance in slower corners.
Clearly, a great deal of work has been done behind the scenes on both the mechanical and aerodynamic fronts, allowing the MCL38 to find a working window that makes it effective in high-speed corners—where Red Bull still remains the benchmark—but also in low-speed areas. Significant work has also been done on aeroelasticity, but a particularly interesting front is the total overhaul of the rear wing range, leading to seven different configurations throughout the season, along with the work done on the beam wing, which offers even more options.
The fact that McLaren has introduced so many rear wings does not necessarily mean they are all brand new. In some cases, especially at the start of the year, the base came from wings used in the second half of the previous season when the team began investing. In 2023, the Woking team started the process of updating its technical package, beginning with the medium and high downforce configurations, which they believed would provide the most benefits for the rest of the season, leaving work on the low downforce version for a later time.
The interesting aspect is that McLaren now has an extensive range of rear wings in its arsenal to adapt to many scenarios, in addition to all the work done on the beam wing to find the right balance. For example, at Silverstone, the Woking team had three different configurations available to ensure the best possible stability relative to the generated drag. The fact that the configurations had similar downforce levels, without a major jump, allowed them to switch to a higher downforce version on Saturday in anticipation of rain, without overly penalizing top speeds.
More generally, McLaren has made versatility its strength, with configurations for many different situations, even in high downforce conditions. For instance, while other teams at Zandvoort used a medium or very high downforce version, similar to Monaco, the Woking team arrived with an intermediate version, further expanding their range of options.
“With the wing we had for Monaco, we think it was specific to Monaco. Since we’re reviewing and updating our wing family, we thought we should choose a lower drag level than Monaco’s and decided to also update that in the process of developing our rear wing family, as we’ve done with the others,” explained Andrea Stella at Zandvoort, describing how the team is working to update all the rear wings.
An interesting aspect is that, aside from the downforce generated by the mainplane, the team also works on other elements, such as the outer shapes of the flap depending on whether more or less downforce is needed, along with different beam wing configurations. For example, in Singapore, the team introduced a double beam wing, with the upper element evolving to provide more downforce, working closely with the diffuser and lower part of the rear wing.
Overall, as confirmed by Anrea Stella, the work on the medium and high downforce package has paid off, as the MCL38 is now the most efficient car thanks to developments in two areas: the car’s body, which allows for significant downforce generation from the floor, and the wings. “I believe that at the moment, our car in high downforce configuration has the best aerodynamic efficiency on the grid. In low downforce configuration, I think the efficiency of Ferrari and Red Bull is much more comparable to ours,” added the Team Principal.
At Spa, McLaren introduced a new low downforce aerodynamic package, updated according to the latest development trends at McLaren, to achieve greater efficiency. “Even the Spa wing was a new one, but it was updated with more modern concepts.”
McLaren’s work has not been limited to the floor’s performance. It’s clear that the Woking engineers have meticulously worked on multiple areas of the car, progressively updating each critical area of the car, including the beam wing and both the front and rear wings. It’s no coincidence that this season, aside from the controversies sparked after Baku regarding the flexibility of the DRS flap, there has been much talk about the functioning and effectiveness of McLaren’s wings, as they have worked to achieve great versatility in different scenarios.
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