McLaren nake noise over Verstappen’s Brazilian GP upgrades

The aftermath of the Brazilian Grand Prix has sparked a fresh controversy in the Formula One paddock, with McLaren questioning Red Bull’s decision to fit Max Verstappen’s car with a brand-new power unit complies with cost-cap regulations.

The issue emerged after Verstappen started the race from the pit lane, having taken a full set of new power-unit components and altered his car’s setup after a disastrous qualifying session.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella raised eyebrows when he publicly questioned whether Red Bull’s engine change was genuinely motivated by reliability concerns or if it was, in reality, a performance-driven upgrade designed to regain lost speed.

“If the engine was changed for performance reasons, it should go in the cost cap,” Stella said, hinting that the move might exploit a grey area in F1’s increasingly complex and evolving financial rules.

The enforcement of these financial limits has remained controversial. Red Bull were previously found in “minor” breach of the 2021 cost cap, earning them a fine and reduced aerodynamic testing allowance, an episode that continues to shadow their dominance.

Stella’s challenge taps into wider concerns about transparency and consistency in F1’s policing of costs. If Red Bull’s new engine is deemed performance-related yet excluded from the cost cap, rivals may pressure the FIA for clarification—or even a rule review.

As F1 heads into its final rounds, this debate underscores how competitive tensions extend beyond the track.

While Verstappen’s pace remains the benchmark, it’s McLaren and other teams who are now demanding that the FIA ensure that fairness, not financial flexibility, determines the results.

Under the FIA’s regulations, teams are limited to a certain number of power-unit components per season. Additional changes typically incur grid penalties and, in some cases, may also influence a team’s cost-cap accounting. However, the line between reliability-related replacements and performance-driven upgrades is not always clear.

Stella’s comments highlight growing unease among rival teams that Red Bull, already dominant in recent seasons, might be benefiting from regulatory flexibility not available to others.

Red Bull said the new engine was necessary to ensure reliability after the RB21 showed unexpected performance issues at Interlagos.

Yet, given Verstappen’s poor qualifying result and subsequent decision to overhaul both the setup and the power unit, rival teams suspect the change was at least partially motivated by a desire to boost performance rather than prevent failure.

The cost cap, introduced in 2021, was designed to level the playing field by limiting how much teams can spend in a season — currently around $135 million (about R2.3bn), excluding certain expenses like driver salaries and marketing.