After winning the championship, McLaren’s defence has begun unevenly, but Japan offered a clear sign of recovery when Oscar Piastri delivered the team’s first podium of 2026. With Andrea Stella running sporting and technical operations and Zak Brown overseeing commercial strategy, McLaren retain the leadership and structure to compete for a third consecutive Constructors’ title — the key question is whether performance and reliability can be restored quickly enough.
How the opening rounds played out
Pre-season running hinted the car could be competitive: McLaren completed more laps than any other team in testing and, with the Mercedes power unit, arrived with high expectations. In qualifying Piastri generally had the edge over Lando Norris across the first three events, though Norris did get the better of his team mate in the Shanghai Sprint.
Race weekends have been mixed. In Australia Piastri crashed on the way to the grid and could not start, while Norris recovered to fifth, lacking race pace against Mercedes and Ferrari. China was worse: both drivers dropped places in the Sprint and then both McLarens suffered electrical problems at the race start, leaving them stranded. Suzuka marked a turnaround — Piastri produced his best qualifying of the year, led early, and converted his pace into second place, ending Mercedes’ streak of 1-2 finishes. Norris added a solid fifth.
Why there’s reason for optimism
McLaren’s in-season development capability is a major asset. Their 2024 upgrade programme transformed performance mid-season, and the team’s engineering depth makes further gains likely this year too. Progress in understanding and exploiting the Mercedes power unit should also yield performance as the engineers and drivers extract more from the package.
The driver pairing is another strength. Norris arrives as the reigning World Champion and remains sharp in racecraft; Piastri has shown resilience, responding to a difficult start with a strong Suzuka performance. That intra-team competition and mental toughness can drive development and setup advances.
Reasons to be cautious
Despite improvements, limitations remain. Stella has acknowledged McLaren do not yet have the same command of the Mercedes power unit as its originator, which restricts how fully they can exploit it compared with Mercedes themselves. Closing that gap may take time, during which Mercedes are likely to stay the benchmark.
On pure race pace, Piastri held George Russell at bay in Japan but did not string together the kind of dominant stint that Mercedes have shown when in clean air. The Safety Car later blurred what might have been revealed over a longer, uninterrupted run. Ferrari’s consistent competitiveness adds further pressure: McLaren must often contend not only with the Silver Arrows but a strong Ferrari pair on many weekends.
What the team is saying and planning
Stella has admitted surprise at how competitive they were in Japan and set a clear target: improve chassis performance by a few tenths to be competitive more often. The team has signalled significant upgrades are coming, including a substantially revised car planned around Miami and the Canadian Grand Prix. Drivers praised the team’s execution in Suzuka and stressed that the extended break before Miami will be used to prepare and deliver upgrades.
Where McLaren must focus
A full integration and understanding of the Mercedes power unit is essential. That will require close technical collaboration, detailed on-car data analysis and careful calibration to exploit deployment, cooling and packaging advantages. Chassis development is the other priority: targeted upgrades that deliver the few tenths Stella describes are crucial if McLaren are to move from occasional podiums to consistent front-running results.
Helping Norris unlock more pace from this generation of car is also important. Sharing Piastri’s setup and telemetry where appropriate, and using both drivers’ feedback to converge on optimal configurations, could accelerate performance gains and improve consistency.
Conclusion
McLaren remain a team to watch. Suzuka proved they can challenge the front in the right circumstances, and the organisational structure and upgrade capability are in place. The pathway back to sustained contention is clear: rapid learning about the power unit, focused chassis upgrades, and smart use of both drivers’ data. If they replicate past mid-season surges, McLaren could yet re-establish themselves as genuine title contenders in 2026.