McLaren MCL33 marks start of new era at Woking

The car will race in a bright new livery that draws its inspiration directly from the team’s iconic papaya orange and blue colour scheme that McLaren first raced in Formula 1 50 years ago.

Last year they took a shift away from the Ron Dennis era colour schemes for their cars. But what emerges was a Manor-esque and largely forgettable livery.

Although the winds of change are blowing through Woking, the new management are very aware of the team's heritage and thus the new car pays tribute to McLaren's iconic orange era.

The MCL33 will be driven by Fernando Alonso, the F1 double world champion entering his fourth consecutive season with McLaren, and his team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne, who is starting his second season in Formula 1.

The engineering philosophy of the MCL33 follows the roots established by its predecessor, with data accumulated from the 2017 season feeding a range of improvements. Much of the work on the MCL33 has been around optimising the packaging of the new Renault engine, and the incorporation of the new halo device.

Technically, the McLaren MCL33 is a logical development of last year’s car. But it’s been developed and refined with the benefit of a year’s experience with the current regulations.

“With last year’s car, we had to commit to certain decisions about architecture based on what we knew at the time,” says Tim Goss, McLaren’s Chief Technical Officer – chassis.

“With a year of track learning behind us, we’ve used that understanding to adjust some architectural decisions. That means we’ve been able to revise all the sorts of things you bake into the chassis at the start of the year.”

“We’re definitely continuing along the same trajectory,” continues Goss. “For launch, the car will look evolutionary, and we will continue enhancing the MCL33 through testing and the race season.

In terms of development, the design team has focused on refining the package; making it neater, simpler and more elegant."

“That’s always been an area of focus for us,” says Goss. “But, this year, we went beyond to get a neat and tidy packaging solution. And that just gives the aerodynamicists more scope to play with the bodywork.”

The MCL33 will conduct a dynamic filming day at a Spanish test track on Friday before beginning eight days of pre-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya next Monday.