‘We will keep racing the McLaren way’ – Stella reaffirms Norris and Piastri will have ‘equal opportunities’ in 2026

Andrea Stella has reaffirmed that McLaren will continue to provide “equal opportunities” to both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in 2026, with the Team Principal stating that the squad will “keep racing the McLaren way”.

The Woking-based outfit became known for their ‘papaya rules’ last season, an approach that focuses on treating both drivers fairly. While the strategy occasionally faced external criticism on the occasions where it backfired, it is one that the team are sticking with going forward.

Reflecting on this ahead of the MCL40 first hitting the track at the upcoming Barcelona Shakedown, Stella praised the squad’s drivers for their support on the matter as he explained: “We talked last year quite a bit about internal racing at McLaren, so let me say that from that point of view, we will enter 2026 with continuity.

“We will keep racing the McLaren way. If we have been able to achieve success in 2024 and then in 2025, what has added extra value to what we have achieved is the way in which we have achieved in such a collaborative, supportive way – [a] cohesive way – together with our drivers.

“I actually [came here] straight from a meeting with Oscar, and before I was having lunch with Lando. The 2026 season is already fully on, even in terms of how much the drivers are engaged, and I was particularly pleased to see how energetic, proactive, full of ideas, but also full of support to the way we have gone racing the McLaren way in the past. So that's the perspective of going into 2026 racing from a team point of view.”

Despite this, Stella acknowledged that there may be ways in which the team “streamline” their approach, having tried to learn from the areas that they could improve on from last season.

“I can certainly say that like anything that we approach at McLaren, we go through a thorough process of review such that we can see where are the opportunities to improve, and this was the same for what we call the racing principles and the way we go racing and internal competition,” the Italian said.

“We got quite a lot of feedback already during the season last year. We had conversations after the season and we are having conversations pretty much as we speak now.

“All this has led us to reaffirm fundamentally, like I said before, that the concepts of fairness, integrity, equal opportunities, sportsmanship, they are all fundamental for the team, for Lando and for Oscar. So they are reaffirmed, they are confirmed and consolidated, if anything.

“At the same time, we all acknowledge that the volume of work required, for instance, for the team and to some extent even for the drivers related to internal competition was important.

“Therefore, any attempt we can make to make this going racing together just simpler to some extent will be welcome. It will be in reality a matter of finetuning because, once we reviewed what we have done, in most of the cases we said that's exactly what we would still do again.

“But we found a few opportunities in which we can streamline the way in which we operate collectively – like I said, reaffirming the fundamental principles that we have adopted in the past.”