McLaren was the story of the 2025 Formula 1 Season. Not only did they win the Constructors’ Championship for the second straight season, but they won the WDC, with Lando Norris topping Oscar Piastri for the title. Can they do it again in 2026? Here’s the McLaren Team Preview for the 2026 Formula 1 season

Key team facts

Full Team Name	McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team
Base	Woking, England
Team Principal	Andrea Stella
Technical Directors	Rob Marshall (Chief Designer), Mark Temple (Technical Director, Performance), Neil Houldey (Technical Director, Performance)
Engine Supplier	Mercedes-Benz
2025 Championship Position	1st

2026 McLaren drivers

Lando Norris:

The reigning World Drivers’ Championship winner walks into the 2026 F1 season in car #1 and with a target on his back. 21 drivers are going to be fighting for his crown this season.

Norris was the first British driver to win it since Lewis Hamilton, and is the first winner for McLaren since Hamilton in 2008. Speed has never been an issue for Norris; the key question has been consistency. He started fine, but got better as the season went along. However, a few setbacks for him and McLaren allowed Max Verstappen into the fight.

If he wants to retain the championship, he’s going to need to even out some of the bumps this season. McLaren’s papaya rules mean that even his teammate will be gunning for him this season, and Norris will need to show that he deserves to be in the running again in 2026.

Oscar Piastri

After the first five races, it felt like Piastri’s crown last year, but he fell out dramatically as the season went on and wasn’t able to claim the trophy. This year, he’s going to be looking to end the season as well as he started.

Piastri is a fantastic driver and has the skills and car to earn the championship. The question this season is going to be mindset. With nine grand prix wins to his name, there is no doubting his capacity to do it, but it’s all about putting it together in 2026.

If he can push past Norris reliably, the trophy could be his this season, but if not, he could be just another guy in the running.

McLaren technical breakdown

Every car is going into 2026 on a reasonably even playing field, with the new regulation changes for this season. McLaren’s car is substantially lighter than last season’s, and the car has prioritized powerand efficiency over downforce and cornering control. This should make the car faster on the straights and provide an advantage when passing in those zones.

McLaren finished the Barcelona testing, putting in 395 laps between their two drivers. This is among the most of all the teams on the grid. Oscar Piastri recorded the team’s fastest lap time, but looking deeper, the speed he has found has been primarily on the straights, with him losing time on the corners.

While going faster than others on the grid gives him the greatest chance of winning, struggling around the corners creates more wear on his tyres and risks issues over an entire race.

McLaren has been very coy about how they have felt going into the season, pointing to Ferrari and Red Bull as having superior cars. Is this real or just gamesmanship? We’ll find out in a few weeks.

McLaren’s leadership and personnel changes

The big name around McLaren is Zak Brown. The American executive has been with the team since 2016 and has had a single-minded focus on winning since taking charge of the team.

McLaren has grown under his leadership to become one of the top teams on the grid, but also one of the most commercially successful in this era. Similar to the Vegas Golden Knights in the NHL, the team has a tenacity to win at all costs.

Team Principal Andrea Stella has been with McLaren since 2015, after following Fernando Alonso when he moved from Ferrari. He grew through the ranks at McLaren before becoming Team Principal at the end of the 2022 season.

Stella is reportedly behind the Papaya Rules philosophy that McLaren runs, although the team has been far from consistent in their application.

McLaren technical directors

Technically, the team operates a three -pronged approach to their technical directors. Rob Marshall is the Chief Designer for McLaren, joining the team after spending 17 years with Red Bull. He worked primarily alongside Adrian Newey, who is now Team Principal at Aston Martin. Marshall is most responsible for the physical design of the car.

Neil Houldey has been with McLaren since 2006 and has worked his way up through the engineering ranks of the company before taking this role in 2024. This gives him a ton of institutional knowledge of the car and a deep insight into the car and its design philosophy. He works very closely with Marshall on the design of the car.

Mark Temple has been with McLaren the longest of the group, joining in 2003. However, he was primarily a race engineer to start, working with Lewis Hamilton as his race engineer from 2010 to 2011, before moving to the technical side in 2017.

He has been the one putting the pieces together, looking for areas of improvement in the data between car performance and driver performance. Temple has also been the public voice of the team when describing the car design philosophy this season.

2026 McLaren performance expectations

You have to figure McLaren will be right in the thick of both the Constructors’ and Drivers’ Championship hunts this season, but it really is anyone’s guess as to how they do.

Given the strength of both of their drivers, they should be favourites to win the Constructors’ for a third straight year. Ferrari or Mercedes should both challenge for this, but Antonelli’s experience and Ferrari… being Ferrari should give McLaren the edge here.

Can either of the McLarendrivers win the WDC? Yes, either absolutely can, but the key will be consistency. Piastri went six races without being on the podium, and the team had multiple pointless finishes towards the end of the season. If they can avoid this, it could be either driver winning it all. I feel like they fall being Russell this season, but with the regulation changes, it really is anyone’s year.

What to expect from McLaren in 2026?

The key question for McLaren is whether they can three-peat as Constructors’ Champions in 2026. With the regulation changes, it will be less about how teams start, but more about how they adjust as the season goes on.

The good news with McLaren is that they have the skill, drive, and, most importantly, two excellent drivers to be able to learn and grow as the season wears on. There will be a learning curve, but you have to think that Norris and Piastri have the skills and ability to figure it out this season.

Read all of our 2026 season previews here:

Red Bull Racing | Williams | Cadillac | Haas | Aston Martin | Audi | Ferrari | Mercedes | McLaren |