McLaren won’t copy Red Bull’s “win-at-all-costs” mentality · F1 · RaceFans

McLaren believe they can challenge Red Bull in the championship without resorting to the same tactics as their rivals.

The team accused their rivals of encouraging Max Verstappen to break the racing rules as he fought Lando Norris in last week’s race at the Red Bull Ring. The pair eventually collided.

Following the race McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said Verstappen had been emboldened to push the limits of the racing rules because he had been inadequately penalised for a series of incidents involving Lewis Hamilton when they fought for the championship in 2021. Verstappen won the drivers’ title that year while Mercedes clinched the constructors’ championship.

The fight between Red Bull and Mercedes became increasingly bitter over the course of the season. Red Bull petitioned the stewards to impose a second penalty on Hamilton following a collision between the two drivers at Silverstone. They went to the length of using one of their test drivers to simulate Hamilton’s racing line in a bid to strengthen their ultimately unsuccessful claim.

McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown said he is under no illusions about the strength of the challenge Red Bull represent, but said his team won’t compromise its competitive ethics in the fight between them.

“We’re prepared to go toe-to-toe,” he said in response to a question from RaceFans. “‘Nasty’ is not how McLaren goes racing. I think you can go to toe-to-toe, but you don’t have to be nasty about it.

“They seem to, at times, have a ‘win-at-all-costs’ mentality. That’s not how we go racing. But we think you can go toe-to-toe and take the fight to them our own way.”

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Norris is Verstappen’s closest threat in the drivers’ championship, but lies 81 points behind him with 362 available. Although it is the first time Norris has been involved in a championship fight, Brown believes he is capable of winning.

“I think to win the Formula 1 world championship, everyone needs to be at 100%,” he said. “I think Lando’s learning every time out there. He’s got the benefit of one win. Max and Lewis and [Micheal] Schumacher – I think when you’ve won as much as they’ve won, that gives you a lot of experience.

“Lando’s still getting that experience of winning grands prix, which I think is great because the only way to get in is to get stuck in there. And I think he’s just going to continue to improve as a driver.

“I think…