Zak Brown says his McLaren F1 Team benefitted from having two strong drivers throughout the 2020 Formula 1 season, which enabled them to beat the BWT Racing Point Formula One Team and Renault DP World F1 Team to third place in the Constructors’ Championship.
Brown, the CEO at McLaren, felt Daniel Ricciardo carried the Renault team for much of the season, while Sergio Pérez’s performances at Racing Point were far superior to those of Lance Stroll, especially in the second half of the campaign.
With Carlos Sainz Jr. and Lando Norris behind the wheel, McLaren scored two podiums and scored two hundred and two points, with the Spaniard finishing just eight points ahead of the Briton in the Drivers’ Championship.
Pérez won the Sakhir Grand Prix and outscored Stroll by fifty points, while Ricciardo was fifty-seven ahead of his team-mate Esteban Ocon. Racing Point ultimately finished fourth in the championship, seven points behind McLaren, while Renault were a further fourteen points back in fifth.
“[Esteban] Ocon was strong at the end, but Daniel carried the team,” said Brown to Motorsport-Total.com. “Sergio [Perez] was on a completely different level and carried the [Racing Point] team.
“We benefited from having two strong drivers – not just one.”
McLaren also finished ahead of Scuderia Ferrari in 2020, but with Sainz switching to the Maranello-based squad for 2021 in place of Sebastian Vettel, Brown says he expects the Italian outfit to fight back with two strong driver’s next season.
“We know they will have two very strong drivers in Carlos and Charles [Leclerc],” said Brown. “So, you have to assume that they will be back where we expected them to be already this year.
“It will therefore be very difficult for us.”
