Mclaren's 2016 season so far

Honda has clearly made big strides on the reliability front, but still significantly down on power compared to the sharp end of the grid. But clearly fast enough to give faster cars a hard time passing them if they manage to get in front. Another way to look at it, Mclaren-Honda was around 2 seconds off the pace of the sharp end last year. Now they were 1.2sec of the pace of the sharp end in practise 2 at Canada. The encouraging factors of Mclaren-Honda's season is they have a healthy number of engine tokens available to develop the engine through the season at this point in time.

Thus, the real question is, how much can they develop the engine by the end of this season? Between the start of 2015 and 2016, they have managed to pull back about 0.6sec relative to the sharp end. They would need to make a bigger stride by the start of 2017 as it would take them at least 3 seasons to catch up with the front end cars at the 2015 rate. They would, at a minimum need to find at least 0.8 sec to be in the mix of the top three teams. I suppose you may want ask if there is 0.8 sec in the Honda engine. There is a good indication this year that Honda is capable of finding the requisite 0.8 sec by the end of the season. There is also the opportunity for Honda to find more time in between the season going into 2017 as well. Thus, the ideal result going into 2017 is for Honda to turn up for the start of the 2017 season with an engine that is 0.2 - 0.3 sec closer to the leading car in 2017. If this happens, there is a great chance that Alonso would challenge for or with a bit of luck win his next DWT in 2017 or 2018 at the latest. This of course depends on how the sharp end teams are doing with their development.

But with rule changes which have a significant impact on chassis and aero characteristics next season, any team could end up with a major advantage like the Brawn did for Jenson Button.

I have to say, it is looking progressively better at Mclaren-Honda. Particularly for our chances of seeing the brilliance of Fernando Alonso realistically fighting for a championship before the end of his illustrious career. I really hope that once more, we get a chance to witness Alonso at his finest at the front before he retires.

The Honda's performance is slowly improving but it seems their reliability is still a problem. They have the highest rate of engine failures during races so far this season with 3. (Ferrari have had 3 or 4 but that's with 8 cars.) As far as I can make out, Massa's retirement yesterday was the first engine retirement during a race for either Mercedes or Renault. So there is ground to make up for Honda there as well.

Apparently their fuel consumption is still an issue as well.

Umm...

As for 2016, perhaps they can overhaul Toro Rosso now that they are missing Max Verstappen, but that's about it. Minor points in races for the rest of the season.

As for 2017. At best I can see them as fourth team behind Mercedes, RBR, Ferrari (whatever order).

What happens beyond that I am not entirely sure to say since it is hard to predict already one season in advance.

McLaren-Honda package is lacking everything. PU is down on power compared to all others, chassis is lacking compared to other top teams.

Personally... I have to say that... although Ron Dennis is a legendary team principal, I suspect he is "past it" now. Nowadays younger TP's like Toto Wolff and Christian Horner are doing the business. Ron probably still believes McLaren is the best team of F1, but that's very far from reality.

Ferrari had a major coup d'etat in 2014, when everyone starting from di Montezemolo was replaced. I feel McLaren needs to do the same thing. But of course no-one dares to say it out loud, because Ron Dennis IS McLaren, and who is gonna replace him? :p: