The British team will run a temporary colour scheme at the next two F1 races in Monaco and Spain, which incorporates the three livery designs of its cars that won the 1974 Indianapolis 500, the 1984 Monaco GP and the 1995 Le Mans 24 Hours.
It had faced a tight turnaround to change the vinyl wrapping that McLaren uses to add its livery to its chassis aerodynamic surfaces given the Imola event was set to be the first round of F1’s first triple header of the 2023 season.
Once the race in north-eastern Italy was cancelled, following what has been described as the worst flooding in the country in a century, teams were eventually allowed back into the paddock to retrieve their cars and equipment and send that on to Monaco for this weekend’s race.
McLaren had always planned to change its livery at a facility away from its Woking base following the Imola event, but instead was able to get started a day earlier once the bodywork panels from MCL60s that Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri will use in Monaco and at Barcelona had been recovered from the Imola track.
The work also included changing the colours of the spare panels and wings the team had been planning to transport through the first part of the planned triple header.
When asked to explain how it had to adapt its plans for incorporating the new livery onto the MCL60s by Autosport, McLaren Racing COO Piers Thynne replied: “We were in full ‘delivery mode’ into the Imola event and it was a very tricky situation for everyone in that region.
“It is important that we just reflect on was it the right call? And it absolutely was the right call to cancel that event.
Source: Autosport