McLaren team principal Andrea Stella believes Formula 1 is experiencing a golden age of driving talent, declaring the current generation of top contenders the most competitive in the sport’s history.
With his own pairing of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri locked in a fierce title campaign, Stella’s effusive praise underscores a remarkable grid where “seven or eight” drivers possess the skill to claim Grand Prix racing’s ultimate prize.
The numbers back him: half the field are race winners, 10 have taken pole positions and only a handful have never stood on a Formula 1 podium. Even qualifying sessions – long the most accurate talent barometer – have become knife-edge contests.
Stella – a man who has been on the grid for 25 years – has been watching it all unfold with admiration.
“I think what we see in this season in Formula 1, in terms of competitiveness – and this is something that you may pick for a little bit of analysis – I don't recall that there was such a competitive pool of drivers in any other season,” he said in Brazil, quoted by Motorsport.com.
A Championship-Caliber Field
The McLaren boss believes the sheer number of elite competitors is unprecedented. In his view, Formula 1 now boasts enough championship-calibre drivers to fill more than a third of the grid.
“The new generation of drivers, they're just so good, and now you have seven, eight drivers which are at world championship level. Like I say, I'm not sure this has happened before,” the Italian added.
According to Stella, much of this surge in quality is rooted in the hyper-professionalised world of junior motorsport – like the FIA F3 and F2 championships.
“Potentially this is because of how good the junior categories now are,” he reckoned.
“These guys, they go karting and they have the data. They train at a certain level when they are adolescents. This has made the competitive field extremely, extremely tight, and therefore the difference is in this last one percent.”
Better Prepared Drivers – or Easier Cars?
While Stella credits the modern ladder system for producing razor-sharp young athletes, there is another side to the debate. Some argue that today’s Formula 1 machinery – thanks to more predictable aerodynamics, hybrid torque management and refined simulation tools – is simply less treacherous than the bruising V10 and V8-era cars of two decades ago.
In that view, it’s not just that drivers are more prepared, but that Formula 1 itself is less likely to punish inexperience. Whether that diminishes the achievement or enhances it remains a topic of lively paddock discussion.
Whatever the explanation, Stella believes fans are witnessing something special. The margins between drivers have never been thinner, the opportunities for upsets never greater, and the level required to succeed never higher.
With Norris and Piastri proving themselves equal to the challenge, McLaren’s team boss seems thrilled to be leading a title fight at a time he considers truly elite by historical standards.
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