McLaren rule out late-season F1 upgrade despite Max Verstappen threat

McLaren have ruled out changing their F1 development plan despite the threat posed by Max Verstappen in this year’s title race.

Verstappen claimed his third win in four rounds on Sunday at the United States Grand Prix.

With five races and two sprints to go, Verstappen is 40 points behind Oscar Piastri in the title race.

Lando Norris’ second-place finish at the Circuit of the Americas means he’s cut Piastri’s lead down to 14 points, with Verstappen 26 behind Norris ahead of Mexico this weekend.

McLaren boss Andrea Stella has confirmed there will be no new upgrades or parts introduced during the final five races.

“When it comes to new upgrades, new parts, then this will not happen for the rest of the season,” Stella said.

McLaren had the pace to challenge Verstappen

It was a suboptimal weekend for McLaren.

Both cars crashing out of the sprint race on Saturday put them on the back foot in terms of car setup.

Sky Sports’ Ted Kravitz has suggested that McLaren were “conservative” with their ride height choice due to a lack of data from the sprint.

Stella has also hinted that McLaren had more performance in the car in hindsight.

“When it comes to new upgrades, new parts, then this will not happen for the rest of the season,” Stella told reporters in Austin.

“Well, first of all, I think in terms of the trend, today is a relatively reassuring race because I think without having to fight with Charles, which was certainly an entertaining fight itself, I think Lando had the pace to win the race today,” Stella explained.

“Obviously, he needed to gain the position on track, which is never easy with Max, and with a one-stop strategy, not necessarily we would have had many opportunities from a strategic point of view, but performance-wise, I think we are reassured that the pace was sufficient to fight for the victory.

“Like I have explained to some of your colleagues as well, I think not having done the Sprint Race left us a little bit on the back foot from a set-up point of view.

“And in hindsight, we can see already that there was more performance that we could have extracted from the car.”