Is a McLaren/Honda divorce imminent?
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With Fernando Alonso’s latest comments about needing a win in the next 3 months to be persuaded to stay, it looks like McLaren could be losing their star driver. Anything can happen in Formula One, but I think most of us would agree that McLaren winning one of the next series of races in 2017 is next to impossible. Unless… Alonso knows something we don’t?
There is no way that Alonso could be picturing an imminent victory without one of the following happening:
1) A freak race.
A race strewn with rain, Safety Cars and odd strategy calls COULD lead to a win (assuming the car makes the finish), but would mean very little in terms of future prospects.2) An engine upgrade that Honda are quietly very confident about.
Why would Honda keep such an upgrade quiet when they are currently the laughing stock of the Formula One paddock? I can’t see this being the case.3) McLaren are very confident in their chassis and believe that bolting on a competitive engine would mean victories.
McLaren have never been short of cash. I’d imagine they could buy their way out of the Honda contract immediately and bolt on (appreciate that there are technical linkages to attend to… Brawn GP managed it) a new engine in time for a few races time. Could this then mean a race win?In my opinion either it’s Option 3, or Alonso is without doubt leaving McLaren.
Where could he go? Surely not back to Ferrari… Red Bull is off the cards… Mercedes line-up seems reasonably solid… Renault are looking at Perez… I’d love to see what he could do in the Williams… anyway…
I think it has come to a point where the McLaren guys are straight embarrassed by all the Honda failures and just want to spent the rest of the season in a courteous manner as regards their commentary on the situation. And they will do all they can to get a new engine supplier for the next season, because they can’t go wrong with any other engine.
Just listening to the radio transmission between Alonso and his engineer after the car failure from yesterday (even though it wasn’t the engine) was cringeworthy. You could hear the destructive impact on the morale of the team this season already has had on them.
Doesn’t McLaren have the resources and technology to build their own engine? I’ve always wondered.
And as regards your points.
2) An engine upgrade that Honda are quietly very confident about.
– In a situation where the engine has neither power, nor reliability, you’d need a completely new engine to improve both. If they only improve one of these aspects, it’s still going to be not enough.3) McLaren are very confident in their chassis and believe that bolting on a competitive engine would mean victories.
– Unless they have a 1998 McLaren or a 2009 Honda/Brawn chassis, they’d need a top engine to really compete against the Ferraris and Mercedeses.
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