Max Verstappen pinpoints ‘incredible' reason for McLaren's F1 advantage
McLaren clearly have the best car on the grid, as proven by the constructors' standings where they are a mammoth 299 points clear of second-placed Ferrari and have all-but sewn up the title ahead of the summer break.
It's a similar story in the race for the drivers' crown with the title looking like a straight shootout between the team's two drivers, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.
Just three of the 14 races so far have been won by a driver from another team with Verstappen taking the chequered flag twice and Mercedes's George Russell triumphing in Canada.
Piastri leads his McLaren teammate in the drivers' standings, although Norris closed the gap to a mere nine points by winning in Hungary in the final race before the summer break.
Over the past 18 months, McLaren's MCL39 appears to keep it tyres alive longer than any other car on the grid. That has led to plenty of speculation as to why but while Red Bull star Verstappen acknowledges that the minimal tyre degradation does play a role, he has highlighted another reason for their success – their medium corner speed.
'It's definitely better on its tyres', Verstappen told the media. 'But at the same time, I think their medium speed performance is incredible compared to, I would say, everyone else on the grid.
'The rotation that they have on the front axle, without losing the rear, is something that is also quite incredible to see, and that's something that we have to try to achieve.'
Any mid-season improvements from their rivals may come too late to catch a rampant McLaren but the rule changes coming into force for the 2026 season could signal a shifting of the guard.
In the meantime, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella responded to Verstappen's cornering speed assessment.
'That's an easy answer because it can be answered just by looking at the GPS data,' Stella replied. 'When you look at the speed comparison with some other teams, the data says that McLaren can generate the highest mid-corner speed in medium-speed corners.
'So, I think the assessment of Max is correct.
'We still have our weak points. If you go on a very high-speed corner like Copse, for instance, or Pouhon, we are not the fastest car. Likewise, probably in very low speed, we are not the fastest car.
'But the majority of corners in a championship happen to be medium-speed corners, and certainly in that range, our car is, data in hand, the best.'
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