McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button in the 2011 Hungarian Grand Prix
Active years: 1966-present
Previous identities: none
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History
McLaren is one of the oldest active teams in F1, and has been in competition every year since 1966. The team was formed by New Zealand racer Bruce McLaren, who lost his life while testing one of the Can-Am cars which bore his name at Goodwood in 1970.
Four years later the team won its first world championship with Emerson Fittipaldi, and a second came in 1976 courtesy of James Hunt.
But the Teddy Mayer-run outfit fell down the grid before a takeover by Ron Dennis in the early 1980s. The reinvigorated outfit pioneered the carbon fibre chassis and became the dominant force in F1 from 1984 until the early nineties, with the likes of Niki Lauda, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna winning championship.
After splitting with Honda it found a new engine partner in Mercedes and added further championships in 1998 and 1999, Mika Hakkinen taking the drivers’ title in both years.
More might have followed in 2007 but the team was implicated in a scandal over alleged spying on rivals Ferrari. Given a record fine of $100m the team were thrown out of the constructors’ championship and both Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso lost the drivers’ title at the last round by one point each. The team bounced back to win the drivers’ title with Hamilton in 2008.
Results
| 1966 | 1967 | 1968 | 1969 | 1970 | 1971 | 1972 | 1973 | 1974 | 1975 | 1976 | 1977 | 1978 | 1979 | 1980 | 1981 | 1982 | 1983 | 1984 | 1985 | 1986 | 1987 | 1988 | 1989 | 1990 | 1991 | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | |
| Championship position | 9 | 10 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 8 | 7 | 9 | 6 | 2 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 11 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 |
| Points | 3 | 3 | 52 | 38 | 35 | 10 | 47 | 58 | 73 | 53 | 74 | 60 | 15 | 15 | 11 | 28 | 69 | 34 | 143.5 | 90 | 96 | 76 | 199 | 141 | 121 | 139 | 99 | 84 | 42 | 30 | 49 | 63 | 156 | 124 | 152 | 102 | 65 | 142 | 69 | 182 | 110 | 0 | 151 | 71 | 454 | 497 |
| Wins | 0 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 12 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 15 | 10 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 9 | 7 | 7 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 10 | 0 | 8 | 6 | 2 | 5 | 6 |
| Pole positions | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 8 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 15 | 15 | 12 | 10 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 12 | 11 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 7 | 3 | 8 | 8 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
Drivers
Complete list of McLaren F1 drivers
Headquarters
Woking, Surrey, United Kingdom
Major team personnel
Team principal: Martin Whitmarsh
Managing director: Jonathan Neale
Technical director: Paddy Lowe
Operations director: Simon Roberts
Sporting director: Sam Michael
Team manager: David Redding
Design and development director: Neil Oatley
Engineering director: Tim Goss
Chief aerodynamicist: Doug McKiernan
Head of vehicle engineering: Mark Williams
Head of vehicle design: Andrew Bailey
Principal race engineer: Phil Prew
Race engineer (Lewis Hamilton): Andy Latham
Race engineer (Jenson Button): Dave Robson
McLaren featured articles
- McLaren MP4/1: Carbon fibre revolutionary
- Inside the McLaren Technology Centre
- Fernando Alonso and Pedro de la Rosa’s emails led to McLaren’s punishment
McLaren latest articles
- Whitmarsh: "We are in the entertainment business, we have to make the show"
- Whitmarsh expects no repeat of 2011 testing problems
- Exhaust-blown diffuser ban "a real challenge", say McLaren drivers
- McLaren MP4-27 and MP4-26 compared
- McLaren MP4-27 launch - first pictures of McLaren's 2012 F1 car
- McLaren are runners-up again after troubled start to 2011
- McLaren to have new car ready for first test
- 2011 F1 driver rankings no.3: Jenson Button
- 2011 F1 driver rankings no.5: Lewis Hamilton
- McLaren goes carbon neutral
Browse all McLaren articles
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