Brown: Our aim is to continue the legacy Bruce started

McLaren are celebrating their 60th anniversary this year, and for that they have named their 2023 F1 challenger the MCL60, a car that will be driven by Lando Norris and rookie Oscar Piastri.

Needless to say, McLaren are yet to return to the winning ways of their illustrious history, and will be looking to do so, or at least take a step towards that this season under the new leadership of Andrea Stella who was promoted to Team Principal after Andreas Seidl left for Sauber.

Previewing the 2023 F1 season, McLaren CEO Zak Brown wrote a letter on the team's website; he wrote: "When the first McLaren racing car, the M1A, rolled out of our original Feltham workshop in west London, it set into motion an incredible journey that has spanned the past six decades of competition.

"From humble beginnings, the company, founded by the legendary Bruce McLaren in 1963, has grown to be one of the biggest and most successful outfits in the history of the sport.

"Under his inspirational guidance, McLaren quickly established this team as a leading light in motor racing with our iconic, papaya-liveried machines thrilling fans as they powered to victory in various categories around the world.

"Today, our aim is to continue the legacy that Bruce started and strive for future success on the race track," Brown declared.

"In 2023, as we celebrate 60 years of this great organisation, we plan to reflect on the amazing achievements along the way: 12 Drivers’ and eight Constructors’ World Championships in Formula 1, 183 Grand Prix wins, three victories at the Indianapolis 500 and winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans at our first attempt - not forgetting our incredible automotive heritage, creating the most pioneering road cars in the world.

"Throughout the course of this season, look out for a number of exciting moments to mark our historic anniversary as we pay tribute to the men and women, the drivers, engineers, and mechanics who helped guide our success. In addition, we’ll be demonstrating many of the greatest cars to have been built at McLaren over the past 60 years," the American revealed.

Speaking of his revised driver lineup, Brown wrote: "I’m very excited to welcome our rookie Oscar Piastri to our F1 team.

"The Australian comes to McLaren with an impressive CV, having won both the Formula 3 and Formula 2 championships. In the short time he has had to integrate with our team personnel in the factory, Oscar has already shown his commitment to us and is very determined to succeed on the race track.

"Partnered with our ‘veteran’ Lando Norris, I’m in no doubt we have the best young driver line-up in Formula 1," he maintained.

As for new Team Principal Andrea Stella, Brown commented: "Our new F1 Team Principal Andrea Stella is extremely experienced and, having been with McLaren since 2015, understands every aspect of our organisation.

"With long-term key infrastructure projects set to be operational later this year, the future under Andrea’s leadership is extremely bright. They include our new manufacturing facility, simulation tooling and our own wind tunnel," he explained.

Reflecting on McLaren's 2022 season, Brown wrote: "Despite Lando securing a podium at Imola, we acknowledge that our finishing position in 2022 - fifth - is not where we want to be, but we come into the new season with a realistic perspective.

"Last year featured a significant change to the regulations, and it will take time for the gap to reduce between the front and the back of the grid. And the closeness of the competition will continue to be assisted by the budget cap.

"While it was disappointing to see breaches of the cap last year, everyone involved has learned from the process and it’s important to see the sport is moving forward in this regard.

"I trust there won’t be a repeat of these financial breaches in 2023," the McLaren top man hoped.

That final hint at the cost cap saga of 2022, comes as another dig at Red Bull who were found to have breached the cost cap and fined $7-Million while having their aero development time cut down by 10%.

Brown, during that saga, sent a letter to the FIA insisting what went down was cheating, something Red Bull took offense at, while Brown just labeled it as "volunteering an opinion".