Zak Brown is confident in McLaren's ability to challenge in 2024 but admitted that Red Bull will still be the team to beat at the front of the Formula 1 field.
Aside from a floor update in Hungary, Red Bull brought forward very little and were still incredibly successful in 2023.
McLaren, on the other hand, have been in constant pursuit of the stopwatch, having brought multiple upgrades to date. This may have affected how much time they have spent on their 2024 car, however.
But team boss Brown is in positive spirits ahead of next year's challenge, though he did concede that Red Bull are the favourites to retain their crown.
"Well it's probably going to be Red Bull but I would not want to rule anybody else out," he told Sky Sports F1. "There’s a lot of great teams on the grid. We're feeling really good about our car for next year.
"[It's] hard to kind of know when Red Bull maybe stopped developing this year's car to get going on next year's. But we definitely feel like we will take a step forward but so will the entire grid and we’re just going to have to wait and see."