F1 aero expert predicts 'SPICY' Dutch Grand Prix as Red Bull rivals claw ground to Verstappen

The first half of the 2023 Formula 1 season has come to an end and the summer break is nearly over.

Throughout the season, many teams made improvements to their cars, but McLaren's upgrade was the most impressive. The initial car they introduced at the beginning of the season faced several issues, mainly due to a necessary 15mm increase in ride height which affected both the drivers and the team.

However, they had high expectations for the upgrades that were coming and they have proven to be successful.

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In this article, we dive into the data to understand where McLaren have improved and what can we expect from them going forward.

McLaren’s gap to pole position

The graph displayed below shows the percentage difference between McLaren's position and the pole position in F1’s 2023 season.

It is widely believed by F1 experts that if the difference is more than one per cent, then the team is battling in the midfield. McLaren's performance leading up to the Spanish GP was within the one to two per cent range, indicating they were far from the fight for pole position.

However, following the updates implemented at the Spanish GP, the range decreased to 0-1 per cent. Since then, McLaren has been consistently in the battle for pole position.

It's important to disregard the spikes observed in the Canadian and Belgian GPs as both qualifying sessions were held in wet weather.

A dire start

The figure above shows the qualifying lap comparison between Max and Norris at the 2023 Bahrain GP while the figure below shows the same for British GP.

Here the low-speed corners are shown with a red circle, while yellow circles are for medium-speed corners and green ones are for high-speed corners.

We can see that in the Bahrain GP, McLaren was slower than Red Bull in nearly all the corners, especially the medium-speed ones. In addition to that McLaren also struggled with their straight-line speed.

So, in short, the McLarens were, for the first three races, the worst team on the grid.

McLaren fighting back

Following the Spanish GP, McLaren made several updates to their car's floor and other components. However, their focus shifted towards generating greater downforce rather than reducing drag.

This was evident in the British GP, where they performed better than Red Bull in low and medium-speed corners, but the increased drag caused them to fall behind in on the long straights at Silverstone.

A change in performance

Prior to the updates, McLaren’s speed in medium-speed corners was almost 5.9 per cent slower than the Red Bull. However, after the upgrades, McLaren’s speed increased and was 3.2 percent faster than Christian Horner's team.

Additionally, the pace difference in high-speed corners and at the end of straights increased from 1.94 per cent to 1.99 per cent and 1.14 per cent to 1.93 per cent respectively.

These numbers are obviously dependent on the setup choices of the teams for that given race weekend but there’s no doubt about McLaren’s upward trajectory.

What does this mean for the Dutch GP?

The Dutch GP is primarily a downforce-sensitive track so, in principle, it should favour the Papaya team provided the conditions remain warm.

McLaren are expected to bring a 0.1–0.2s update to Zandvoort which should see them be more competitive, but with virtually all teams expected to bring upgrades this weekend, things could get a bit spicy, at least in the battle for P2.

Shubham Sangodkar is a former F1 Aerodynamicist with a Master's in Racing Car Design specialising in F1 Aerodynamics and F1 Data Analysis. He also posts aerodynamics content on his YouTube channel, which can be found here.

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