Am not big on statistics, but it seems to me they have more than their fair share of DNFs because of faults. Anyone know how many they have had in the last couple of years?
Not just the last couple of years, they've had issues with reliability for years, 2005 Kimi came second in the WDC, he didn't score points in 5 races, races he was either leading or would bagged a fair few points, Lewis and Fernando had issues in 2007 when one of them should have won the title, in 2010, a couple of issues cost Lewis big points that could have seen him bag the title and this year, Lewis has had 3 race wins taken from him as well as the chance to score a bag full of points in other races due to reliability or pit stop issues.. For a team that prides itself in the pursuit of perfection they're doing a piss-poor job in trying to achieve it!
McLaren reliability is the reason Kimi has only won the WDC once. They haven't had a good run reliability wise since the Hakkinen days imo.
I liked Kimis comment "We didn't have the speed of McLaren but if you don't finish the race that is the problem." No doubt remembering his days there. What makes me laugh is that the car was most reliable when it was a slow in 2009, not a single issue in the first half of the season. When its fast its becomes unreliable
As both a supporter of Kimi and Lewis I have rather grown accustomed to the sight of a slowing silver arrow (are we still allowed to call a McLaren that?) that now I am barely surprised at the number of DNFs Lewis has got all season through mechanical failures. As Iceman mentioned reliability cost Kimi two WDCs at McLaren and it has cost Lewis one this year as well. What is worrying is that back in 2005 it was almost always the engine that packed up over the course of the race weekend so they knew what the major problem was, and since that year they have not had too many engine failures from the Mercedes, now however its always a different part of the car failing which means they are always going to be concerned about the car not making the finish which makes me think they may well have similar problems next year. Will Buxton was quite funny yesterday slightly pandering to the trolls by pointing out that McLaren's reliability woes have only really come to surface this year since Lewis's move to Mercedes became public knowledge...
The sports cars are not race cars. In terms of race cars: the more one pushes the envelope, the more one encroaches upon reliability. It is quite a simple equation but not necessarily calculated in the same way by all teams. Ferrari are a very easy example for comparison with McLaren (and to some extent, Red Bull) in 2012.
