McLaren team boss Andrea Stella is convinced his team has amassed “data, videos, facts, analysis, [and] GPS” that prove Max Verstappen “definitely” turned under braking while battling Lando Norris in the closing laps of the Austrian Grand Prix.
Yes, the conversations surrounding Austria are still flourishing as we complete practice for the British Grand Prix, and McLaren’s Andrea Stella added more context to the conversation by sharing that he’s confident his team can prove Verstappen deserved a more critical eye from the stewards.
“There’s nothing personal” in McLaren’s stewarding requests
Speaking to Sky Sports after practice for the British Grand Prix, Andrea Stella mentioned the McLaren team was ready to move on from the Austrian Grand Prix — but that there’s still work to do in the stewarding department.
“There are different things to consider here,” Stella said. “The first one is that Lando, you know, he’s the one that needs to drive, to sort of move on.
“Like if you stay with your head one week ago, you’re not going to do a good job here in Silverstone.
“We see that the car is competitive, and we definitely want to capitalize, so Lando is looking forward, and we support this point of view.
“The second consideration is that at no point this is a personal matter. At no point there’s an attempt, certainly not from us, to polarize the views — it’s black or it’s white.
“That’s not the case I think anywhere in the world, there is polarization [when]. That’s not what we want.
“But for me, there are data, videos, facts, analysis, GPS data, which we spent quite a lot of time trying to confirm our initial opinions.
“I have to say that our initial opinions were confirmed.”
“So [Max] did turn under braking?” Stella was asked.
“Yes, definitely,” he asserted.
“And like I said straight after the race, if these maneuvers were addressed immediately with a warning, with a black and white flag, I think there would have be no escalation.
“This is clear. This is clear, I think, to the stewards as well.
“Now is the time to move on, learn as much as possible for the opportunities that we had, and there was a lot of information coming from Austria [to] put Formula 1 in a better position in terms of policy and enforcing the regulations that are already in place as to how you go racing.
“And then we look at this weekend now.”
More from McLaren before the British GP:
👉 Zak Brown makes feelings on Christian Horner very clear as Red Bull rivalry heats up
👉 Lando Norris names biggest British GP threat — and it’s not Red Bull
While it may seem like McLaren is encouraging this conversation to play out exclusively in the headlines, Andrea Stella denies that’s the team’s intent.
In fact, Stella says that it doesn’t need to speak directly to Red Bull; McLaren’s point of contact is higher up the chain of command.
“Our counterpart in this kind of conversation is actually the FIA.
“Like I said before, there’s nothing personal, there’s nothing polarized. I think I said immediately, [I have] a lot of respect for Red Bull, for Max, for what they have achieved, but our counterpart is the FIA and the stewards.
“We just sought clarification and we were actually satisfied with the answer we received from the stewards and the FIA.”
Read next: British GP data: McLaren vs Red Bull, Ferrari in trouble, Aston Martin revival