McLaren find themselves in this position because of their remarkable progress since Brown made Andrea Stella team principal in December 2022.
The move was prompted by former team principal Andreas Seidl telling Brown he would be joining Audi in 2025 in time for the start of their F1 programme.
Brown decided to expedite the process. He let Seidl go early and promoted Stella. Seidl’s departure was followed by that of James Key as technical director and head of aerodynamics Tony Salter.
Since then, McLaren’s turnaround has been nothing short of astonishing. They admitted they would start 2023 slowly, a legacy of design errors made in 2022, but said they could see progress was coming.
The first big upgrade to the car in mid-2023 leapt them from the lower midfield to the leading pack behind Red Bull, where they were competing with Ferrari and Mercedes for the rest of last season.
This year started with them third fastest behind Red Bull and Ferrari, but a major upgrade in Miami – on pretty much the whole of the car – put them toe-to-toe with Red Bull, and they have been there ever since.
Brown points to Stella and the changes he has made to the team’s structure and operations as the main reason for this.
“He unlocked the talent that we already had here,” Brown says. “We’ve got approximately 1,000 people here in F1. I changed three. But it was three leaders. So 997 are the same people who gave us the [uncompetitive] car at the beginning of 2023.
“A leader’s job is to get the most out of their people and that’s what we didn’t have previously. We weren’t able to let the talent we have in here flourish.
“Andrea communicates very well. He listens very well. He’s very hard-working. He’s very technical. He leads by example. All the traits you would want in a great leader. He unlocked the potential this team clearly had sitting there.”
Stella joined McLaren in 2015 but was not promoted to team principal for another eight years. Why?
“Truth be known,” Brown says, “I offered it to him the first time around [when Seidl was appointed in January 2019], and he declined it. He felt he wasn’t ready.
“Andrea is someone who knows his capabilities and doesn’t overreach.
“The second time around he knew me better, knew the team better, even though he’d been here a while. And still he didn’t say yes in the first phone call. It took a couple of days because he’s very methodical, very thoughtful.”