McLaren plans more MCL40 upgrades after Austin slump
NXTbets Pro | Published On: October 28, 2026
McLaren upgrades plan
McLaren plans further upgrades to the MCL40 later in the 2026 season after leaving the United States Grand Prix without a podium for the fourth straight race, even though the team has brought new parts during that stretch. Andrea Stella said the car has shown more pace than the finishing order suggested and matched Ferrari and Red Bull on raw speed, but McLaren has struggled to turn that into a better qualifying result. He said the team expected only limited updates for Mexico City and looked ahead to more significant developments for the Sao Paulo and Las Vegas rounds. That gives McLaren a clear development path, but it also shows how much work remains before the team can convert race pace into results. The recent run has exposed a familiar problem. McLaren has had speed in the package, yet it has not consistently found the lap time when it matters most on Saturday. Stella pointed to qualifying as the place where McLaren has been unable to unlock the performance it believes is there, which has left the team chasing better grid positions and a cleaner route through the race. That issue has shaped the team’s approach to the next phase of the season.
United States Grand Prix
Lando Norris recovered to finish fifth in Austin after a qualifying setback left him eighth on the grid. A track-limits deletion in qualifying dropped him back, and McLaren’s plan then forced him to work from the middle of the field. Oscar Piastri finished seventh, leaving McLaren with both cars outside the podium places on a day when the team believed it had more to offer. Norris briefly ran second on an alternative one-stop strategy before Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton all moved ahead of him. McLaren’s call gave Norris a chance only if a Safety Car came late, and that break never arrived. The race left the team with a familiar split between speed and result. Norris made progress on strategy and for a stretch looked like he could turn the day into something better, but the race settled back into the order that reflected the grid more than the pace he felt in the car. In a race built around tire strategy and track position, the team found itself with opportunities that never fully opened.
Norris and Stella
Norris did not hide how demanding the MCL40 felt at the United States Grand Prix. He said the car was “the hardest I have ever driven in my life.” He also said McLaren needs to improve qualifying and slow-speed corners after losing nearly three-tenths per lap in Austin in those sections. That assessment lines up with Stella’s view that the team has pace it has not been able to extract in the right places. McLaren’s problem is not a lack of speed in isolation. It is the gap between what the car can do in the right conditions and what it delivers when a lap has to come together under pressure. That gap has shown up in qualifying and then again in the race, where starting position has forced the team into recovery mode. Norris’ comments point to the same areas Stella highlighted, with qualifying and low-speed performance sitting at the center of the next upgrade push. McLaren now heads deeper into the season with a clearer picture of what it needs. The team has pace to build on, but it needs cleaner execution on Saturdays and more consistency through the slow sections if it wants the MCL40 to match its potential more often.
