McLaren: New nose will ‘unlock more potential’ from 2020 F1 car

McLaren believes the new nose concept it introduced at the Russian Grand Prix will help it unlock “even more potential” from its 2020 Formula 1 car.

The Woking squad raced with the Mercedes-style nose for the first time at Sochi, having introduced the design ahead of F1’s homologation deadline for major parts changes.

Although McLaren recorded its worst result of the season so far by failing to score points for the first time in 13 races in Russia, team principal Andreas Seidl remains confident that its latest package will ultimately deliver more performance from its MCL35.

"With the mid-season homologation date, we obviously wanted to gain experience with it as quickly as possible," Seidl explained.

"That's why we also decided to actually test it step-by-step as soon as we had certain parts of this package available.

“So, the target is clear: that's the development direction we have seen in the windtunnel with this different nosebox concept. It is something that we believe is the right direction to head to for the future.

"It gives us more potential, in terms of unlocking even more potential from the car in terms of performance. And that's the direction we are heading to.

"So the plan is to gradually now bring step-by-step more parts of this package to the track, with a clear goal to unlock more performance."

McLaren has continued to bring updates to its car on a race-by-race basis amid a titanic battle over third place in the constructors’ championship, a position it currently holds by just two points from Racing Point.

“Following on from the upgrades deployed in Russia, we’ll continue to upgrade the car and aim to improve performance over the remainder of the season,” Seidl added in the team’s Eifel Grand Prix preview.

“We need to keep consolidating our strengths, improving our weakness, being mentally resilient and pushing as one unified team in the fight for points.”