McLaren's hit a real rough patch, and team principal Andrea Stella's latest comments show just how puzzled they are by it all. After blanking entirely in Baku and scraping together just 10 points at Sepang, the Woking outfit's brilliant mid-season form has completely evaporated. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri have gone from winning races to struggling in the points, and Stella's now grappling with something he can't quite explain through the data.

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The drop-off's been pretty dramatic when you think about it. Norris was winning grands prix in Hungary and the Netherlands before the summer break, and honestly should've taken Spain too if not for that virtual safety car timing that caught him out. At Sepang especially, strategy decisions didn't help matters, but Stella's pointed out that Malaysia's abrasive track surface played havoc with how the car behaved. A lock-up in Baku cost Piastri a potential podium, while Franco Colapinto's crash took Norris out entirely. It all stacked up.

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Here's where it gets interesting though. Stella's reviewed all the data from both races and found absolutely nothing wrong, nothing out of place. The car worked where it needed to, generating the downforce and grip required. The team's even added upgrades that should've pushed performance forward. So what's going on? That's the question keeping Stella up at night. He reckons McLaren might've simply been outpaced by competitors who've developed their cars better, which is both vague and worrying in equal measure.

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McLaren spent the summer reshaping the MCL40 with new front wings, floor tweaks, and that Macarena-style rear wing everyone's been talking about. They went further in Baku too, grabbing ideas from Audi, Mercedes, and Ferrari to push harder. But none of it's translated into the results they had before. Stella's saying they'll reassess everything from Singapore onwards and hopefully find their feet again before the season winds down, but right now they're operating blind, which is never a good position for any team fighting for podiums.

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