Brown happy with staff transfer from Red Bull: 'Has a lot of ideas'

McLaren caught up impressively last season. At the beginning of the season, they raced at the back of the field; in the second half of the season, they regularly competed for the podium spots. CEO Zak Brown hopes his team can take the momentum into 2024. At least this year, they will get hhat from David Sanchez and Rob Marshall, two engineers Brown speaks highly of.

Marshall worked for Red Bull Racing for the past 17 years. In recent seasons, he held the position of Chief Engineering Officer at the Austrian formation. David Sanchez came over from Ferrari, where he was the Head of Vehicle Concept. With the two acquisitions, McLaren now hope to take the next step.

Brown confident

"I think the team showed last year what we are capable of and now with having Rob and Davide joining, that's just some added horsepower, if you like, and we have all of our infrastructure up. Still a journey to get back to the very, very sharp end of the front of the field but I feel like we do have what we need. Now we just need to beat the other nine teams out there, which is never easy," Brown told Sky Sports.

"We are excited, the team is highly motivated. We had a strong second half of the year and I just hope we start a little bit stronger than we did this time last year," the 52-year-old American said, continuing about Marshall: "He has got a lot of energy, a lot of ideas. He's been around a lot of world championship cars so I'm sure he'll bring some valuable experience to the table."

McLaren were the first of the teams in the top class of motorsport to unveil their livery this week. The 2024 car, the MCL38, will be unveiled on 14 February.