Aggressive McLaren, will start testing from day 2: “We wanted to give ourselves more development time”

McLaren will miss the first day of testing in Barcelona. This was announced by Andrea Stella, who announced the team’s strategy in a press conference with various industry publications, including FormulaPassion. This is a plan agreed upon at the table, with the aim of delaying the freezing of the project as much as possible. However, the heir to the MCL39 has already been assembled and is undergoing all the usual checks on the dynamic benches. The plan “We are on track with the plan to start testing on day two. We didn’t feel the urgency to do so from day one.” With these words Andrea Stella informs that the world champion team will not be seen on the track before Tuesday, but not due to a production delay: “With the 2026 car we have been ambitious. At the same time, the redesign has been so extensive that we have to be cautious, to be sure that we actually have a car, that we can build it on time. To date, our program is going according to plan, which is obviously something we are happy about. The car is now on the AVL dynos, in Austria”. The Team Principal refers to the benches used to verify the correct functioning of the car’s various systems once assembled, after having already tested them individually in Woking. Once testing is finished, the new Papaya single-seater will head to Spain: “The car will then be in Barcelona for its track debut, which will take place directly at testing. Our plan is to start testing on the second or third day, so we won’t run on the first. We wanted to give ourselves as much time as possible for development.” McLaren has decided to take advantage of the opportunity for teams to choose three days out of the five scheduled for testing in Spain, a rule initially thought of as a safety measure in case of reliability problems. Photo by Mark Sutton – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images No hiccups Andrea Stella reassures that the decision does not depend on any unforeseen events in the assembly of the new car: “It was always plan A. The change is so big that we don’t necessarily have to be the first to go on the track. We wanted to give ourselves as much time as possible to develop, because, for every day of design, the performance improved.” The Team Principal is aware of the contraindications of this approach, but remains convinced of the chosen strategy: “If you get on track straight away, you will have the reassurance of knowing everything you need as soon as possible. At the same time, however, it means that you could have frozen the car project relatively early. In that case, you would have sacrificed development time and absolute performance”, concludes the Italian.