Q & A SESSION WITH MARTIN WHITMARSH
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Perhaps it's worth saying the geniuses come
after me.
DAVID CROFT: Well, I thought I'd give you the option to be a genius
or not. Thanks for joining us. This is the first time we've
heard from you this morning, so we ought to start with the
car; what do you think?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Well, it's already been commented on, it looks
beautiful. I should probably pull these chairs away, stop
hiding it, but -- no, it looks beautiful at the moment, but cars
really do look beautiful if they win races. And, you know,
the beauty is more than skin deep. I think there's
tremendous engineering underneath. A lot of thought has
gone into this car and, really, refinement. I'm sure it will
look different when it gets to Australia. That's the nature
offer Formula 1 these days, we're constantly evolving the
product, but I think it's nice, when you're going to have to
stand around a car for quite a long period of your life during
a year, if it looks good at the outset that helps us.
DAVID CROFT: Lewis and Jenson said there's only one goal at the
start of the season; is that your goal as well, to win
a championship?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Well, yeah, I'm sure it's no surprise to
everyone here that our goal is to win two world
championships this year. That's what we exist to do.
That's what we try to do every year. We don't always
succeed. It's a very challenging, competitive series and -- but, you know, we are there or thereabouts. We don't like losing. Coming second the last two years has had it's frustrations. You know, we're proud of some great moments and some create victories in those years but ultimately we want to win and we want to win world championships.
So, you know, we're very fortunate. We've got two great racing drivers, who are -- they're good on the stage here as well but they're also good in the car, they're good on the track. They're fearsome competitors. I mean they have -- I think anyone can detect the chemistry, they have a great relationship, but they want to beat each other very badly, but in a very positive way. And I think that spurs them on, it spurs the team on.
They talked about the genius that we have and -- the genii that we have in the team. Then we're very fortunate, we've got a very strong team. Some of them will be on the stage later and they can talk to you in a more informed way about the car, but I think it's important that -- that they work, as they have said, with the drivers. It's important we listen to them, it's important they listen to us as well, but I think, you know, it's important as a team that we all listen to one another. We all have views and opinions; some of the team members are better informed than others; but I think we've all got the passion, the desire to win, and I think that,
you know, that comes across for anyone, I think, who
spends team in this organisation. You know, we expect to
win, we have that burning passion to do so. And we know
that that's a combination of brilliant team work, great
people, inspiration, hard work, dedication, discipline,
attention to detail, all those things which are very much
part of McLaren DNA, that's what you need to win in
Formula 1 today.
So, you know, there's some very strong competitors out
there but I think we're feeling at the moment that we're in
a good place. We know there's a long season ahead of us,
we're looking forward to getting testing, developing the car
and getting to that first race and campaigning for
championships.
DAVID CROFT: Just before we open up questions to the floor once
again, Martin, on the subject of this season: six world
champions, for the first time ever; new race in North
America; DRS and KERS hybrid; evolutions of those.
What are your thoughts about the season in general? How
close do you expect it to be?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: It will be close. It's a massively competitive
championship these days. There's no doubt about that.
No one, in my view, is going to run away with this victory,
not us, not anyone else.
I think six champions is great for the sport. I think -- we
look at the last two world championships, we've come
second in both of them, but they've been great
championships, they've been exiting. I think development
of the DRS that you mentioned, KERS. In fairness, Pirelli
contributed a lot to the spectacle.
So for a few years I think people were a little bit worried
about -- you know, they recognised Formula 1 was the
pinnacle of motor sport, it was the most technically
advanced, the best drivers in the world, the best teams, but
they were a little bit concerned about the spectacle and the
show, but I think the last two seasons have been, you
know, full of drama, fantastic overtaking, great races, you
know, and just a great television spectacle.
So we can always make it better. The sport sometimes is
a little bit inward looking, a little bit introvert. It doesn't
always do the best job of promoting itself. We have
perhaps too much cynicism in our sport because it truly
is -- you know, there are -- Formula 1 and soccer are the
only true world sports. They're the only two. And we can
make this sport a lot bigger and a lot better. And it's
sometimes a challenge for teams to work together, as we
know, because we're trying to compete, we're trying to beat
each other on a Sunday afternoon, but we're learning
slowly, not always as quickly as any of us would like, but
I think we're in for an exiting season.
DAVID CROFT: Certainly keep our fingers crossed that that will be the
case. Let's take some questions from the floor, please.
This man with his hand up straight away, there?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Mike Dinson(?).
Last year I asked Ron about engines and he sort of
discounted the possibility of you building your own engine,
but you are a company that aspires to be the same as your
Italian rival, I presume in the long-term building
a Formula 1 engine is in your plans but have you for the
time being put that on one side? What is the possibility of
McLaren building their own engine?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Okay, well, firstly, we've got a great partner;
we've been 18 years in partnership with Mercedes-Benz.
They make probably the best engine in Formula 1, so the
motivation to change is very limited. We enjoy that
partnership and we intend to continue for a number of
years. But I think ultimately Formula 1 is a very, very
powerful environment to promote an automotive brand, to
get brand exposure and brand differentiation. We have no
plans, so it doesn't feature in the short-term, medium-term
or long-term, to manufacture our own engines.
You know, I think we're not trying to be a facsimile of
Ferrari. I think we've got great respect for Ferrari and what
they've achieved but I think we've got to do it our way. And
a feature of McLaren is that we've had long-term
successful partnerships. You know, we've got partnerships
on here in excess of 30 years, 27 years. We're very proud
of the relationship with Mercedes-Benz. We think we bring
value to their brand, we give them good exposure and
good competition for their own team, and I think it works for
both of us and I think we'll stay like that for the foreseeable
future.
In the longer term then, as I say, we have no plans to
develop our engine. People will speculate because of our
road car programme but at the moment it makes no sense
to us.
DAVID CROFT: Next question please. Joe Saward was fractionally
ahead.
Martin, if you don't mind standing for this question -- not
because it's Joe, but for the cameras?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Martin, you were talking about
strength in depth of engineering before. This winter you've
been selected by other teams as a place to enlist a lot of
your people. How much of an impact has that had or can
you soak up that kind of loss? It's big numbers of people,
isn't it?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Not big numbers in the total sum of it but we
have lost some people. Our people are attractive to our
competitors. That's a compliment. It might be a frustration
when it happens, but it's a compliment; it means we've got
good people, what we're doing and how we work.
I think we're quieter about how we go about our
recruitment, so we do, of course, recruit very good
graduate engineers that we develop and train within our
business, but we also periodically dip into some other
teams, and I think at least one of them will be on stage
a bit later.
So, you know, I think we are selective generally. Certainly
on the engineering side we've recruited from some of our
competitors. We haven't seen the purpose in advertising
that fact, we just go about it quietly. So the fact is we have
a great engineering team. We're not -- you know, we're not
planning on failing, and we're certainly not going to fail as
a consequence of lack of depth in engineering. We've
great engineers. We've got as many as we need to get the
job done. Providing we work hard, providing we're smart,
provided we make the right decisions, we'll get the job
done this year.
DAVID CROFT: I have a question from Vodafone, but Ian Parkes
first?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Morning, Martin.
Obviously it goes without saying that we're not going to
know how good this car is until it gets out on track over the
next three tests but, compared to the wrong direction taken
at the start of the last season, is there quiet confidence
within the team that you have got it right this year?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Well, firstly, we won't really know until
Australia qualifying, you know, through the practice and
testing sessions that we have in front of us -- we'll be
embarked on a whole range of programmes, but turning to
the real point we had, by -- well, by anyone's standards,
and McLaren's standards, an abysmal winter testing
session last year, where we didn't have reliability or pace,
and I think it was really a tribute to a fantastic team, work
and everyone within the organisation to respond that, and
in fact we arrived in Australia in reasonable competitive
position, which I think surprised a lot of people. But it was
a relatively stressful process, so I'd be much happier to --
to be not fighting those sorts of issues. And I think we've
put a lot of work into this car and we don't think we're going
to have a repeat of last winter.
DAVID CROFT: I have a question, Martin, from Maxine Birmingham
from Vodafone, who asks on behalf of her 10-year old son
Piers -- I think she is probably blaming her 10-year old son
Piers for this: what feature on any of last year's F1 cars do
you wish you'd have thought of in the first place?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Well, I think the blown diffuser we were -- we
had different philosophies but ultimately the teams
converged to very similar approaches. I think we were
very good in developing that but we were -- perhaps went
down a different route so I guess this time last year it
would've been -- we would've been stronger were we to
have had what we had in Australia rather than what we had
at the start of the testing session.
Q. Thank you Piers for that question.
Any more questions from the floor? This man, if you could
stand up, at the front, so we can all see you.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: After last year and the problems
you had in testing, have you been more conservative this
year? Have you held back a bit, do you think, or have you
been able to go gung ho, like you'd like to?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: I don't believe we've been inherently
conservative. Inevitably, there are creative brains out there
that seek to find the eureka moment that is going to find
a second's worth of performance. Sadly, in Formula 1, to
some extent those eureka moments of seconds of
performance increment are very limited and, you know,
nowadays Formula 1 is about refining every single detail
part, so a one or two per cent performance differentiation
from the front to the -- almost to the back of the grid is
made up of tiny, tiny fractions of performance increments
from just about every component within the car, every
system, so -- but if you come up with something which is
performance, you're going to chase it.
I think this year I think we've been -- not cautious, but
I think the way the development has happened, I think
we're finding good performance, we've set ourselves some
tough targets that we think, if achieved, will allow us to win
the world championship. We haven't reached those
targets yet but fortunately we're not at the first race, but the
progress and trend is towards meeting those targets, so
I think we will meet the targets.
If we set the right targets, we'll start to establish when we
get to Australia, because clearly with rule changes, with all
of your competitors -- they're off our radar screen. You
know, during the year, every fortnight we have
a performance calibration, you know, "Where are we
relative to our competitors?" They're off the radar screen,
we've been flying blind now for a few months, and that's
the exciting thing. You know, you have to now set your
own targets; we've got our engineers who have to have
their own moments of inspiration, and they've got to
develop and work hard to make this car competitive.
So, you know, I think we set targets which we believed
were going to be tough. I think we will get there. We'll see
as the season progresses. Then it's not just about --
certainly, it isn't about testing, it's not just about the first
race; you have to improve the car through every single
race throughout a season to sustain a championship
campaign these days and that's something I think we're
quite good at, and I think, providing we have a good and
competitive start to the year, then there's no doubt we'll be
in there for the fight for the championship at the end.
DAVID CROFT: More questions from the floor? Dan Knutson has his
hand raised at the back. Dan, can you stand up? We can't
see you there.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Hi, Dan Knutson, Auto Action.
We're going to Austin, Texas this year. How important is it
for the fans, the sport and the sponsors to be racing in the
United States again?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: I think all the teams believe it's very important
and we've got to make a success of it this time. As we all
know, our time in America has been spasmodic and
unsuccessful. We have to treat it almost as a new market.
But actually, you know, there's a huge interest in Formula 1
that is untapped in the States. We've got to work harder.
You know, what we have to accept is, you know, America
doesn't need Formula 1; we need it more than it needs us.
So I think the onus has got to be on the teams, the
promoter, all of us, to work -- and the commercial rights
holder -- to work very hard to make sure that we educate,
we promote, we develop the interest, we reach out in
America. So we've got to work harder than, perhaps, you
know, a new Grand Prix in Europe or Asia or South
America, where, you know, there is a ready interest and
a ready uptake. We've got a real challenge.
But it's important. It's important to our commercial
partners. The States is still a rather big market for really
any multinational company. We are -- as I mentioned
earlier, there are only two world sports, soccer and
Formula 1, and, you know, for us to be a great world sport,
we've got to conquer the States.
DAVID CROFT: More questions from the floor. Another one in the far
corner there. If you could stand up, please, as well?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Hello, Kate Walker, Girl Racer.
Given what you were saying to Dan about needing to make
a special effort for in the States, what kind of plans do you
have to have tucked up your sleeves to bring McLaren, not
Formula 1, to the American fan?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: Well, again, I think the teams need to work
together. We won't create interest in McLaren Formula 1
team or Vodafone McLaren Mercedes without there being
an inherent interest in our sport, so I hope and believe
that -- we started a range of fan forums, which were very
popular, in the last 18 months, through what was originally
a photo initiative. It is our intention to continue those,
which are -- is reaching out to fans. They take a lot of time
and a lot of organisation but a lot of people turn up and the
quality of the audience has been fantastic. We did one last
year in Canada for instance.
They are things that take a lot of our time but I have never
personally -- I've been to most of them -- never come away
regretting we did it, because Formula 1 doesn't reach out
enough to the fan base and I think we've got to work
harder at that and make sure that we're seen as
accessible, as interested in their views.
You know, the teams have worked hard with fan surveys.
The DRS, which I think was a significant development, the
overtaking capability of the DRS, came as a consequence
of feedback from the fans and an effort on the part of the
teams to make the sport more attractive and meet their
needs. So I think there's a whole range of things that
we've got to do, working together as teams and
commercial rights holder and promoter to make sure that
we are successful in America this time.
DAVID CROFT: More questions, ladies and gentlemen.
Mike Doodson got his hand up first, I think. Sorry, Joe.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Last year, Martin, we saw a big
difference between the two types of tyre provided by Pirelli,
and it resulted in a rather artificial situation sometimes
when -- picking another team -- sometimes you've lost a
(inaudible) against Ferrari and then got it back again when
you moved to the other tyre. That seemed rather artificial
to me. Will the changes to the Pirelli tyres reduce that
factor this year?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: They will, but I think -- I mean -- maybe I have
a slightly different view. I think we often within the sport
view this from a very purist perception and we don't like
these artificial elements -- it's the same argument, people
don't like DRS -- and I can understand and respect that,
but I think we have to accept that, you know, we are in the
entertainment business, we have to make the show.
It -- deeply frustrating for me a few times last year, when
we were on the wrong tyre, or on the right tyre at the wrong
time, and you know it makes it more challenging for the
pitwall and for the drivers, but, you know, I think it added --
personally, I think it added to the show. But as it
happens -- we don't know yet, because we haven't tested
the Pirelli tyres, but the probability is that the gap between
them will be narrowed. So the purists will prefer it.
I wonder, though, whether it will be to the detriment of the
show.
DAVID CROFT: Joe Saward?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Martin, you said that we wouldn't
see the full car until Australia. One, is it true of all the
teams, two, are we going to see sandbagging and
grandstanding, and three, does McLaren do any
sandbagging or grandstanding?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: A series of questions there.
All the teams will develop their cars, I'm sure, so the car
that's unveiled as they pull the cloth back will not be the car
that's being used in Q1 in Australia, and that's a fact.
There will be a greater evolution in some teams than
others I would imagine.
Is there grandstanding and sandbagging? Yes. Do all of
the teams do it? To varying degrees. We don't go out of
our way to grandstand, we've got a long-term serious
programme. I know, you know, inevitably we see it every
year, a team that may be on the point of a new
sponsorship deal that appears to be very quick in some
tests and then suddenly doesn't look quite so quick when it
gets to the first race.
It is so easy. The weight sensitivity, as I think most of you
know, of Formula 1 cars, you can make a car artificially
a second or two quicker if you need to. We don't do any of
that. We could be accused of sandbagging in that we try to
hold back a little bit, but again, not as a real conscious --
we don't try and be too clever on ourselves.
I think really testing for us is data gathering, it's allowing
our engineers to start to work with the drivers, understand
the car, feed back information here so that we can do
a better job of developing the car in the future, and allow
the driver and the race engineers to be in a position that
they can optimise it at the right time, which isn't during the
winter tests, it's when we get to Q1 in Australia.
DAVID CROFT: We have time for one more question, if there is one
more question, and that falls to you, sir, in the middle there.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Martin, what means FOTA
without Red Bull and Ferrari?
MARTIN WHITMARSH: What is FOTA. Well I think, again as
I mentioned earlier, I think it's important, regardless of the
name tag of FOTA, that the teams continue to work
together. We are seeing that the teams, all of them,
including Ferrari and Red Bull, are still participating in the
testing agreement, they've signed the same contracts with
the circuits to go testing, so I don't -- I'm not too hung up on
the brand FOTA. I think what's important is that, you know,
the teams realise there are critical times, there are critical
issues within this sport where it will be better if we
co-operate, take sensible decisions, and I hope and
believe that we'll continue to do that.
It's always difficult because, you know, competitive teams
like to score points against another, and they may have
their own commercial interests and motivations, but I think
overall we've got a responsibility in this sport, it's a great
sport, that we work together to make it better.
DAVID CROFT: Martin, thank you very much indeed for joining us this
morning.
Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team principal,
Martin Whitmarsh. (Clapping)
Well, we've heard now from the team principal on his
thoughts on the season ahead. Shortly technical director
Paddy Lowe and director of engineering Tim Goss will join
us to take your questions on all technical matters.
But first we have a few minutes to focus on all matters
sporting, so if I could please invite Jonathan Neale, the
managing director of McLaren Racing, and Sam Michael,
the sporting director, to our stage please.
Q & A SESSION WITH JONATHAN NEALE AND SAM MICHAEL
(11.54 am)
DAVID CROFT: Thank you very much for joining us. Jonathan, it
must be great to get out and see some daylight, I'm sure.
You've probably be bunkered down here at the McLaren
Technology Centre since, what, the end of the final race in
Brazil last year?
JONATHAN NEALE: It certainly feels that way listening to Lewis and
Jenson talk about how their winters were, and I was
looking at my colleagues here thinking that that feels very
different to the winter we've just been through. And I think
a short winter for us as well, for all Formula 1 teams. We
lost a month in an extended season now where normally
we'd finish work at the end of October and then start on the
engineering programme, we suddenly find ourselves
a month short, the same kind of complexity, the same pace
to win, and a very short testing period.
Testing time is precious, and Martin spoke there about
what happens around sandbagging or grandstanding. It
would be lovely to be in a situation where you have
a second's worth of advantage over everybody else and
you're having to would rein it back. But the reality of the
situation is that we have so much to work to do in such
a short period of time that our mind is on getting the job
done and we'll see what happens in Australia.
DAVID CROFT: You of course have worked very closely not just with
the employees here at the McLaren Technology Centre,
but with the team's partners as well. Vodafone is not only
the team's title partner but also the official Total
communications partner as well. So what does that
actually mean in practical terms?
JONATHAN NEALE: I think for all of our partners -- I mean, the car
behind me is sporting some pretty powerful technical organisations, Vodafone being of course the title partner and a very important one.
We run an organisation with huge global reach and a very competitive product in a world class sport but we're still a relatively small organisation, I have 500 people or so just along the corridor here. To compete with the likes of a driven organisation like Vodafone, with that scale and reach in communications and network, it would just be nigh on impossible. The same is true for Exxon Mobil and
Mercedes-Benz. So we have to be very adept at making sure that we are looking very closely at their research and development programmes and making sure we get what we need from those programmes.
Vodafone, like all of our partners, are a very demanding organisation, very driven in their own right, very high levels of innovation, and their business, like ours, depends on rock solid execution. So from a values point of view we're very closely aligned.
I think as well that they kind of dragged us into the light in the last six years, and I hope most of the people in the room here, certainly from talking to the media in the last twelve months, would recognise a McLaren that is more open and more approachable in the last few years.
Perhaps more inclined to reveal some of the machinery that's going on behind the scenes, and occasionally
inclined to laugh at ourselves as well. I think the virals that
have gone out have had huge reach and probably touched
a much wider audience than we would otherwise have got
to.
Sitting beneath that of course there's the platform of
technology itself. The McLaren Technology Centre runs on
communications that keep us connected in whichever
business we're in around the globe with the Vodafone 1
network. They're helping us make sure that our secure
data, and there's gigabytes of data flying across the globe
through some difficult places to reach, whether we're going
to new territories or whether we're just bringing data back
from favourites like Brazil, then they're there for advice and
security and distribution of that data.
Then at a forensic level, if you like, around the circuits, on
the point-to-point stuff, they're always very involved there.
So right from the cultural piece through to ground level
technology they're actively involved.
DAVID CROFT: Fantastic. I haven't seen all the buttons on the
steering wheel but can we tweet from it yet?
JONATHAN NEALE: I'm sure Lewis can.
DAVID CROFT: Sam, three months since you joined Vodafone
McLaren Mercedes as the sporting director. What struck
you most about your new workplace?
SAM MICHAEL: That's right, it is three months. Good morning to
everyone, it's a pleasure to be here. I'm really proud to be
working for McLaren even though I've not been here long.
I think it is a big family, a lot of the people here they take a lot of care of relationships, obviously externally but also internally as well, and it makes quite a big difference when you're operating in a high pressure environment, and it's much more than what I expected it to be and it helps you perform.
But one of the drivers used a buzz word and I thought -- or the synergy of this place is strength and depth, and its a word that's used quite a lot, and I thought, when he said it, what does that actually mean to everyone who's listening today? Having just started in this company I do have the benefit of being able to observe what that is.
From an engineering point of view and the sporting side, and in terms of the racing team and the people here, the one thing that really strikes you when you come into this organisation is the academic level within the engineering group. It is phenomenal, and it's not just -- it's not just the leaders, it's not just the technical director and the engineering director, it's all the people that work below them, and it is the biggest strength of this company.
One of the questions that came from the floor before to
Martin was about staff leaving to other teams, and Martin is correct, there's equally as many people have come into
McLaren from those top teams in the last twelve months but it's not advertised. But I think even more important
than that, this strength and depth is not something that you
buy off the shop floor, it's not like if you're missing a 7
poster rig or a CFD computer or a wind tunnel, you can get
your cheque book out and buy it and catch up, it's
something that's instilled in this company over many years
by the leaders of this company, and you can't invent it, it's
something that's ingrained in the company.
Even being here after three months I can see that already,
and it's really rewarding working around it and getting to
know the system. I'm still literally on a curve like this. You
don't know a company within three months, I think it takes
you a good year or so to -- and I haven't, although I did two
races at the end of last year it was in a sort
of observational capacity so I'm looking forward to
Melbourne.
Everything so far has been really positive, that's what
I think strength and depth here is.
JONATHAN NEALE: Glad to hear it. I'm sure we've got a few
questions from the floor for either Jonathan or Sam so put
your hands up, ladies and gentlemen.
Ian Parkes, first off the blocks?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Sam, good morning. Towards
the end of your stint at Williams you looked like a man
under considerable pressure in your role as technical
director, as if everything was on your shoulders to try and
get things right there. How much easier have you felt it
coming into this role with, as you just explained, that
strength and depth around you?
SAM MICHAEL: I think, just to say quickly, obviously Williams is
a fantastic team with a lot of heritage and I wish them all
the best for this year. I'm sure they will return to where
they're meant to be.
I think, continuing what I was saying before, a lot of the
people, the engineers here I knew from previous
relationship as well, either within technical working groups
or in the pit lane, so I had quite a good knowledge of who
the people were, not working with them but what their
personalities were like. So it has been really refreshing to
work with them and it's been really encouraging, I've really
enjoyed it.
I know the drivers a little bit as well, the two race drivers
who we've got. Jenson obviously used to drive for
Williams many years ago before I was there but I had a lot
of dealings with him, and Lewis I've known as well through
just contact in the pit lane. But no, its been really good.
DAVID CROFT: Next question, ladies and gentlemen.
Dan Knutson, and then we'll come to the front, and then
we'll com to Joe. So Dan at the back first.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Just to expand on that, tell us
what you've been doing for these three months, what are
your duties, and daily, weekly what do you do here?
SAM MICHAEL: I work within the senior management group. My main
focus within that group is track side, so sorting out the race
team, and when I say sorting out, it's already a very
defined machine. But McLaren is all about making things
better than what everyone else is, and not using existing
standards as a benchmark but trying to create new ones.
That can involve anything from car quality, operational
reliability, the structure of the race team. I work very
closely with the team manager and all the people that work
for him.
It's early days and, as I said, I came in at the end of last
year and a lot of, 90 per cent of the car was already
designed but there's a lot of things structurally around the
race team in the way it operates that it can still have a big
effect on. And there's different aspects to the way we go
racing, and I've had quite a good involvement for the start
of the season.
DAVID CROFT: Joe second but this man first.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Craig Scarborough.
Question for you, Sam. Obviously you've come from
a much broader role at Williams, now in the sporting role
that you've just described. Do you find you are naturally
much more drawn into the design side? Is that more of a
help or a hindrance from your background?
SAM MICHAEL: I think from -- first of all, all of the engineers here that
I've integrated with, I don't think there's been any example
at all of anyone who is not receptive to an idea or open to
input. It's been really, really great, there's not been any --
so you're always coming and giving them a different
perspective on things, you may not be exactly correct in
what you're saying about something. That could be
anything from the process that we employ to do our pit
stops, our build quality systems, or even the design on the
car.
So I think from that point of view it's another strength of the
company, really, in that people have been trained and
brought up in an environment that is very open, and make
sure that you don't have any arrogance at all so that you
don't think an idea could be better.
As I said it may not be, even with my background, it may
not be the exact idea you're talking about but that may
stimulate something else, another route.
DAVID CROFT: Joe Saward first.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Jonathan, I asked Martin a little
while ago about staff losses and the effect they have.
Closer to the work face, if you like, do you feel that more
than he does maybe up in the management offices?
JONATHAN NEALE: I think to put that in perspective, most
engineering organisations, and you could check with
colleagues here, will have a turnover rate of somewhere
between 10-12 per cent I think is industrial norm. Here for
the last certainly ten years the turnover in engineering is
around about 5 per cent, so it's never good to lose key
people, and there are some eye-watering salaries being
paid by teams who would dearly love to have some
talented people from here.
So as Martin said, in one sense it's of no surprise that
people will come and have a look at our talented people.
But we do have a good system of development of young
engineers and diverse talent. There are in excess of 200
engineers, mathematicians and scientists here, 23 different
nationalities. And just by the law of averages, even if my
colleagues might help a few, then statistically we are going
to lose 12 a year, and on that basis we're gonna find that
that's newsworthy for some people.
As I say, the reciprocal part of that is of course it's
interesting to have new people come into your organisation
who will benefit enormously from having the experience of
Sam in here, as we have with some of the engineers we've
taken from other teams. But there's not a skills bleed or a
concern at that level but it's -- I'm happy with it.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: More or less it was the same
question, but are you surprised that many engineers have
left McLaren to go to Italy?
JONATHAN NEALE: Not when you walk down the organisation and
you hear the Latin quarter of our organisation, no. We
have some great Spanish people, some great Italian
people. I think most of the structures department is Italian,
I'm not quite sure why that is. Aerodynamicists have come
from Ferrari, from Renault, from Sauber. It's all part of the
club.
But what's really important to say as well is that of the
recruitment that we've done in the last two years, a good
50 per cent of that has been from outside Formula 1, and I
think we've got some heavyweights in the organisation who
know their Formula 1 business and have been in
Formula 1 in multiple teams for 10 or 20 years. But I'm
equally as excited about some of the graduates that we're
getting who have no experience in Formula 1, and just how
challenging and demanding they're going to be.
So you can see those generations coming behind. I think
Formula 1 still offers really exciting end destination jobs for
science and engineering graduates, regardless of whether
you come from -- where your passport is, or whatever team
you've been or whatever industry, it's a great place to
come and work and we should be proud of that.
DAVID CROFT: Ted Kravitz, Sky Sports F1, talking of people moving.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Thank you, David.
A couple of times last year you got caught out by some
decisions which meant that the drivers maybe didn't qualify
as high as they might. Are you changing any of your
engineering philosophies, Sam, has that been a focus of
yours?
SAM MICHAEL: I think that comes under what we classify here as
"operational reliability", and it's something that is always in
the front of your mind when it happens, especially if it's as
high profile as a driver you're not getting through.
So McLaren obviously has processes in place, because that instance
that you're talking about I believe happened before I was
here anyway, and whenever we make a mistake, and we
always will, our job is to try and stop them but when we do
make them, make sure we put in place proper processes
afterwards to make sure it doesn't happen again.
So, yes, that comes underneath my remit, but on that particular
example that's just one aspect of what we do, and most of
that was already underway before I was here by the
existing people.
DAVID CROFT: Got a question from Dan Miles, Jonathan, who is
watching on Vodafone's intranet and asks: do you feel that
the latest technical regulations give you enough
opportunity to innovate for this season or are they just
getting a bit too restrictive?
JONATHAN NEALE: No, I don't think that they're boxing us in in some
way. I think if you take a 10-year view on regulations then,
yes, as the technology gets better and as our simulation
gets better the regulating bodies have chosen to box us
into a tighter window.
If I compare with that the developments in technology and
the talent and the innovation that's alive inside the
organisations, we don't ever appear to be ideas-limited.
And if you take any one of the cardinal performance
elements of the car, be that engine power or down force,
then you take a 20-year view, you see an almost linear
improvement in performance punctuated by these
regulation changes.
So I think for my colleagues, and I'm sure Paddy and Tim
will give you a view on that as well, the issue is not that we
feel boxed in or constrained in any way. The challenge
that we have on the rear of the car, given the change in the
regulations, opens up a real opportunity for us to test
ourselves against the competition again. It's that that
keeps us alive and running.
DAVID CROFT: We'll speak to Tim and to Paddy in a moment. We
have time for one more question first from the floor.
Michael?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: This year's compounds will be
much closer together than last year, at least Pirelli is
saying that 0.8 instead of maybe the doubler (?). How
does that change the strategies?
SAM MICHAEL: I think it's something we'll have to find out, but
basically what's happened is they've left the soft end at the
same position and they've just brought the harder end
closer to it, and some of those compounds that ran at the
last Grand Prix, it will be something that Pirelli want -- and
the show needs to keep high degradation in the tyres
because they don't want the racing to be stable, they want
it to be variable and mix things up, because it's always
good for the racing.
The target was really to try to shift it back to what it was
like earlier last year because as you -- even Pirelli, you
can't say to a company: make a bad product, because
they're an engineering company, they want to improve
things just like a racing team, and they naturally will
improve things. As well as the tyres improving, the teams
understand how to adjust the suspension geometry and
aerodynamics to improve that. So it will be the same
challenge, but I think you'll probably see a reset back
maybe twelve months.
DAVID CROFT: Sam and Jonathan, thank you very much. You may
now return to your seats.
Ladies and gentlemen, Jonathan Neale and Sam Michael.
Q & A SESSION WITH PADDY LOWE AND TIME GOSS
DAVID CROFT: We have time for two more guests up on our stage
this morning, so please put your hands together and
welcome the technical director Paddy Lowe and director of
engineering Tim Goss to the stage. Good morning.
Right, let's talk technical, gentlemen, shall we? Paddy, if
I can start with you.
On the surface, a logical evolution, the MP4-27, but
underneath plenty of changes, is that a fair description?
PADDY LOWE: Yeah, a create deal of change. I mean, it is in the
nature of Formula 1 now that, as Jonathan mentioned, the
regulations are trimming us into narrower and narrower
boxes, so inevitably we don't see the big radical changes
that we saw in the past from one year to the next.
So this car in many ways looks quite similar but, as you say,
underneath a great deal of change. Every single part has
been assessed, optimised for weight, stiffness,
performance in any other respect. And when you add all of
that up you get a car that's net quicker, that's the name of
the game. So in every area the teams are tasked to find
that 1 per cent, 2 per cent because we're looking for that
total.
Nevertheless there still are, you know, obvious innovations.
We, you know, have done a lot of work around the back
end, as has been discussed, a lot more tidy packaging
there. We've had to respond to the change in the exhaust
regulations, that's really the most significant change from
last year.
So that's given the aerodynamicists a great challenge to
come up with not only the down force but the means of
creating that balance that Jenson and Lewis were talking
about. You need the down force but you need it in a way
that you can use it, so a lot of focus in that area.
DAVID CROFT: At least the drivers don't think it looks ugly so that's
a start on that one?
PADDY LOWE: Yeah. As Martin, I think Martin said, it's a -- a car will
look good if it's quick but it's better to start looking good.
DAVID CROFT: So Tim, an exiting, nerve racking time for a car
designer before it actually takes to the track?
TIM GOSS: Yes, it always is. I mean you work very hard over the
winter period, in fact, well, since about this time last year,
so it has been over the course of a whole year we've
worked extremely hard on it and, of course, you're a bit
nervous and anxious to find out exactly where your
positioned in terms of performance with your opposite
numbers.
We've set ourselves very -- very tough and ambitious
targets, and we fully intend to reach those by the first race
and deliver a championship-winning car. I mean, it is --
I mean a lot of people have been talking about this car so
far over this launch but it is a complete rework from nose to
tail. I think there's very little that we've carried over, you
know. There's a few pieces of the fuel system but
otherwise I think just about everything on the car has
changed.
We've worked extremely hard at producing a very -- a very
integrated, aerodynamic and design package. There is
a few features that we were pushing very hard from early
on in the project and we've just stuck to the things that we
think really, really matter, where we're going to extract
most performance from the car, and I'm just really proud of
the whole team and their efforts so far this year.
From now we go into the next phase of the project, which
is just really wringing the performance out of it, and we
have a really good track record at that, at developing the
car over the season, and already we've got big plans, you
know, and we've got -- we've got upgrades for front wing,
rear wing, floor and body work already planned, and I'm
sure there will be a lot more coming through before the last
race.
DAVID CROFT: I always love that part of Formula 1: you design a car
for the launch but you know that by the time the first race
comes there's many, many upgrades will be put on it.
Let's take some questions from the floor. Andrew Benson
first at the back, then I will come to the guys in the middle.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Paddy, there's a couple of
obvious things stick out from the new car straight away,
one is that you haven't taken the Red Bull eyelet approach
at the front suspension mounting points in terms of the low
nose, and the other is although you have tightly packaged
the rear end you have that big bulge sticking out in the
airflow there which I assume, although I can't see from
here, is an exhaust exit.
Can you talk about those two features a bit please?
PADDY LOWE: Yes, there was a regulation change around the front
end this year to limit the height of the nose and the forward
part of the chassis. We've produced an arrangement
which meets that regulation, at the same time it follows
some of the philosophy that we've carried over from last
year, hence the line is similar in appearance, and we
haven't -- we haven't pursued the route that Red Bull took.
It's a matter of your philosophy and the different trades you
make. You know, you can't see performance necessarily
by eye, it's a matter of fine-tuning the balance between all
the relevant aspects. You know, if you look at the front end
you're talking about trading aerodynamics, trading the
height of the weight, the arrangement of the suspension
and its effect on aerodynamics and stiffness.
So all of these things have to be combined to produce the
best result according to your own philosophy and your own
measurements and that will come out differently for
different teams.
DAVID CROFT: Next question, Will first.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Guys, there's obviously a very
short amount of time between the end of last season and
the start of this season's testing, just 70 days I believe
between where we were in Brazil. Obviously this car has
been a year in development and, as you say, a completely
new car. With rivals such as Mercedes not launching their
car until the second test how difficult is it to weigh up, using
those extra two weeks between first and second tests for
working on the car or getting that car immediately on track
and using those first four days of testing?
TIM GOSS: I think Mercedes GP are clearly an exception in not taking
their new car to the first test. I think the accepted approach
is to get out there as early as you can.
We've worked very hard at putting together a launch
package that is competitive, but then we know that there's
lots of parts of the car that we want to develop, and we
give ourselves the opportunity to do that. So, you know,
the first test will be more about putting mileage on the car,
getting to know the systems, getting familiar with setting up
the car with different aerodynamic characteristics, but then
by the time we get to the third test then we said there will
be a significant upgrade package, and we give ourselves
the time to get that learning in and then get the upgrade
package in.
Certainly we've tried different approaches in the past. This
time round I think it's just the correct thing to do.
DAVID CROFT: Craig, I'll come to you in two seconds but this man
was here first.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Afternoon, gentlemen.
Paddy, last year's car was distinctively long wheel based, I
guess it was because of the exhaust layout at the
beginning. I realise you probably won't give much away,
but can you just tell me whether this car is more compact?
PADDY LOWE: The simple answer is it's very similar.
DAVID CROFT: That's not bad.
Craig.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Craig Scarborough.
Obviously we see the nose you've largely carried over in
concept from last year, but one obvious change is the
change in the side-pod concept this year where you've
gone away from the U-shaped side-pods. Can you tell us
about why the concept's changed, why you don't feel that
was a benefit this year?
TIM GOSS: Yes, last year's U-shaped side-pod worked very well with
what we were trying to achieve last year with the exhaust
layout, it was all intended at creating more down wash to
the rear end, and it performed particularly well last year.
This year at a fairly early stage we set about some --
a different approach to both the external and the internal
aerodynamics of the car, and then once the exhaust
regulations started to become a little bit clearer then it was
quite obvious to us that the U-shaped side-pod no longer
fitted in with both the internal aerodynamics and some of
the external aerodynamics that we pursued early on. So it
works, it worked very well last year, but it's actually just not
suited to what we're trying to achieve this year.
DAVID CROFT: Before we carry on with some questions from the
floor, Keith Cummings is watching today, and is from
Vodafone. He has a question for you, Paddy: with the
changes in the location of the exhaust, and the fact that it
can't be as low as it was, do you think that you've managed
to design in changes that will offset the performance loss,
or are you kind of stuck with it this year? How has that
whole process affected you in terms of lap times do you
feel?
PADDY LOWE: That's a very good question and one I think that will
receive quite a bit of attention.
Clearly the last 18 months, the performance profit area was
all around exhausts and blowing diffusers. We now have
new constraints in terms of the geometry, so that is where
we can put the exhaust pipe and what angle it can be
directed at, all of that intended to keep it high and away
from the diffuser. And there have been some restrictions
on what we can do with the engine, so some of the more
extreme things that were being done to engine tuning in
order to maximise the blowing effect have been severely
restricted.
The fact of the matter, though, is that exhausts exist on
a car, you have to have them, they blow gas. That will
always generate some performance, a finite level of
performance. Even just simply blowing exhaust out of the
back of the car produces thrust that makes the car quicker.
So there still is a very narrow extent to which you can use
exhaust gas to generate performance aerodynamically
much, much reduced from last year. But inevitably, you
know, we've been trying to look at the ways to make the
most of that in the face of the new constraint.
DAVID CROFT: Any more questions from the floor?
Sorry, Ted, one more at the back there, the other hand up.
It's your go, Michael.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Going on with that question on
the exhaust, if you rate the contribution of the exhaust to
the aerodynamics from last year 100 per cent how much
will it be today? And, I mean, last year obviously you were
blowing into the diffuser, are you now trying to blow on to
other aerodynamic components?
TIM GOSS: I think in short we could just say that, you know, it's
drastically reduced. I mean, there are geometric
constraints and you're just not going to achieve the same
effect that you achieved last year. It's as simple as that.
It's reduced a long way. You have to think about treating
the rear end of the car differently and concentrating on
what we'd call unblown performance as opposed to blown
performance.
PADDY LOWE: In effect, the performance we saw if you remember at
Silverstone last year, there was a brief period at which the
engine-tuning was restricted significantly, and we saw
a slightly different ranking between the teams in terms of
performance.
We were hit particularly hard at that point, which for me
was a measure that we'd done a good job in the area in
fact, we'd put our effort into the area that was generating
most performance. But that was an interesting sign of, as
Tim says, you know, what was the unblown performance of
a car, and we've taken lessons from that and built on that.
DAVID CROFT: Interesting.
Ted and then Maurice, if that's okay.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Both of you, the season hasn't
started and already we've had the FIA banning something
that a rival team had in development. Had you looked at
brake-operated ride height adjustments? Did you believe it
was legal, and had you had some in development for this
year?
PADDY LOWE: That was let's say in a family of designs that we've
considered often in the past. By our own assessment we
wouldn't have considered that to be legal so, you know, we
didn't really get involved in what was being done. Our view
is that wasn't something we would pursue. So I suppose it
was pleasing in that sense to see that that avenue was
closed down according to the same interpretation that we
would have taken.
DAVID CROFT: Maurice Hamilton.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Maurice Hamilton.
The lessons learned from DRS last year, have they
influenced your design much, for example, in how you
might use it more in qualifying in the race and so on,
particularly when doing the layout, and related to the
exhaust as well perhaps?
TIM GOSS: DRS was new to all teams last year and there are trades
you play on designing rear wings, in that you can design
rear wings for greater DRS performance and greater drag
drop, but the sacrifice you pay for that is that you tend to
lose ultimate down force and you play those trades a little
bit.
Early on last year we went down one particular route, we
changed a little bit for the second half of the year and put
a bit more emphasis on the DRS drag drop. You know,
you can see this year's rear wing is -- it is a totally new rear
wing but it's evolved along similar philosophies to last year.
We're learning, we know the importance of DRS, but
ultimately you've got to win the race, and whilst DRS
counts for qualifying, most in qualifying, then ultimately you
have to win the race.
Producing the best race car is what we've concentrated on.
We proved last year that we're particularly good in terms of
race pace, and again that's our philosophy and our
approach.
DAVID CROFT: Time for a couple more questions.
Ben Edwards first from the BBC.
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Thanks, David.
Just following on from what we've already heard, is there
a figure, now that you've done all the calculations on the
car you've built it, on the overall loss of down force
compared to last year? Is there a figure that all the drivers
are going to have to cope with? In general terms, maybe
not specifically your loss, but in general terms, and they
talked about it earlier, what is the loss of down force
compared to last year?
TIM GOSS: We've set ourselves some ambitious targets and, you
know, we'd expect to recover a lot of what we lost. You
optimise around a certain package and, as Paddy
mentioned earlier, we thought we were particularly good at
achieving performance from the exhaust system and
blowing the diffuser last year. We -- we paid prices for
that. You pay a price in terms of the base performance of
the car, we knew that, there were prices and trades that we
were accepting, and ultimately last year it produced the
quickest car.
This year we've taken those gains back and worked harder
on them and pushed that area harder so, you know, we
hope to get back a lot of what we lost. I mean, I don't want
to quote numbers, but we've set very ambitious targets
and, you know, we'd like to think that we go back with
an equally competitive car.
DAVID CROFT: One more question. Craig, we've had a few from you,
can we go to Johnny instead?
QUESTION FROM THE AUDIENCE: Tim, you talked there about
producing the quickest race car, but a lot of the foundation
of Vettel's wins last year were on getting pole position,
getting three seconds after two laps, and then controlling
from the front.
Have you looked into kind of extracting more from the car
on a Saturday? Is there a change of philosophy there? Or
do you still think your approach of having a better car on
Sunday can still triumph?
TIM GOSS: Yeah, there isn't a great deal you can do these days.
We've got restrictions in terms of programming the car now
we've got part firmer regulations, so there's not a lot you
can do between qualifying and the race. But one thing we
focus on very heavily, and again have concentrated on this
year, is just the tyre wear life and tyre thermal
performance, and that's about the race performance. In
qualifying you've got clearly, as we mentioned earlier,
you've got DRS you can play with.
Whilst I say we concentrate hard on race performance it
didn't go unnoticed that Sebastian Vettel put the car on
pole an awful lot of times and pulled the gap before DRS
was employed, so we are aware of it, we -- we have
attempted to deal with it again.
DAVID CROFT: Tim -- oh Paddy, you had something to say to that?
PADDY LOWE: I just want to take the opportunity to thank the team
that produced the car. I think many, many people who
I represent with Tim behind the engineering of that car
have worked very, very hard all winter, so just to say
thanks to them. And that includes the sort of wider
partnerships. We have some technical partners, Exxon
Mobile. But even as we said earlier, Vodafone we count as
a technical partner of some of the things we doing, so a big
team of people internally and outside working on this car.
DAVID CROFT: I'm sure they're all watching on line around the world
as well and hopefully very proud of their efforts.
Tim Goss and Paddy Lowe, thank you so much for joining
us on this stage. (Clapping)
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm sure you'll agree that was
a fascinating hour or so that we've just spent. Thank you
so much for your time today. It is time to say goodbye to
all the people who have been watching on line around the
world. Have a very good day.
(12.31 pm)
(The Launch concluded)