MCLAREN ‘MINI-DRS’ LEGALITY VERDICT GIVEN WITH ‘GREY AREA’ DENIAL ISSUED

Oscar Piastri insists that the McLaren rear wing is fully legal, hitting back at the suggestion of exploiting a “grey area”.

Piastri drove his McLaren MCL38 to an impressive second F1 career victory last time out in Baku, but Piastri was not alone in catching the eye after television pictures captured the top element of the rear wing tilting backwards at speed on the straights, dubbed a ‘mini-DRS’ system, utilising an a slot gap opening in the rear wing to boost the MCL38’s straight-line speed.

Oscar Piastri insists McLaren ‘mini-DRS’ fully legal

An FIA statement issued ahead of the Singapore GP confirmed that the governing body is “currently reviewing data and any additional evidence” from Baku, with the FIA taking a closer look at potential flexing in the wings run by teams, but Piastri made it clear that McLaren has passed all inspections.

Asked in a pre-Singapore GP press conference whether there is too much fuss over a few millimetres, Piastri replied: “I mean, it’s legal.

“So yeah, as long as it passes all the tests. You know, we get tested a lot, and it passes.

“I mean, it’s certainly not the magic ticket or magic bullet for why we’re competitive, but it’s legal. It passes all the tests, so I’m pretty happy with it.”

Piastri was then asked how involved he gets with the pushing of ‘grey areas’ at McLaren, or whether he places full trust in the team, drawing a strong denial on that suggestion.

“To be honest, the first time I knew it did that was the same time as everyone else last week,” said Piastri on the McLaren rear wing. “And it’s not a grey area. It gets tested every week. It’s legal. They’ve got a lot of different tests for the rear wings now.

“So, yeah, I honestly didn’t even know that it did that until three days ago.

“In the sport, you find every bit of performance that you can without breaking the rules. And I feel like that’s what we’re doing, and that’s what you need to do to become a championship-winning car and championship-winning team.”

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Piastri does not believe there is anything “personal” at play, claiming it has been par for the course through time in Formula 1 for teams to query the leading cars. McLaren took over from Red Bull as leaders of the Constructors’ Championship in Baku.

“To be honest, I think it’s natural,” he said.

“I think you look at any car that’s been competitive, and it always gets scrutinised to the highest level. You look at the Mercedes a few years ago with their rear wing and infamous €50k touch [involving Max Verstappen and Mercedes at the 2021 Brazilian Grand Prix].

“You look at a lot of the teams trying to work out Red Bull’s DRS effect for the last couple of years. We’ve seen flexi front wings in the past and all sorts.

“So I think naturally, there’s going to be scrutiny of just people curious to know why your car is competitive, so I certainly don’t think it’s personal to us, you know, all the other teams are trying to find… Including ourselves. We’re not just thinking that we’re the best out there and we don’t need to learn anything from anyone else. We’re always looking at the other teams as well.

“So I think it’s only natural. And when you’re at the front, and when you have a car within a second of you for 30 laps and the rear wing camera on there for 30 laps, then naturally people are going to notice it more too.”

McLaren lead the Constructors’ Championship by 20 points over Red Bull going into the Singapore Grand Prix.

2024-09-19T13:25:06Z dg43tfdfdgfd