06/05/2015
NEWS STORY
Ahead of this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix, McLaren has given fans a sneak peek at its revised livery.
The change of livery, which sees the team drop the previous chrome effect, was explained to Pitpass yesterday, a team spokesman telling us: "We have revised our car's livery, improving its visual impact, optimising it for not only bright sunshine but also for the floodlights increasingly used in twilight and night races.
"The result is a dynamic, predatory, graphite-grey colouration, complemented by McLaren-dayglo 'Speedmarks' and keylines, reducing the reflection issues caused by our latest chrome-silver treatment."
It's certainly a bit more noticeable, courtesy of the “dayglow Speedmarks” and a little less grey.
When talk of a livery change first began, the result of the team's move from Mercedes power to Honda, many fans hoped for a return to the 'old' day-glo and white (Marlboro) colours associated with the previous partnership, whilst others even mooted a return to the original Gulf (Oil) orange. Ron Dennis was quick to dismiss the idea.
"We've got the same thing inside (McLaren)," he revealed. "You've got people who say 'Why don't we make it orange?', and I say, 'Why?' 'That was the old colour of McLaren', they reply.
"Why the hell do we want to go backwards?" he continued. "What do you do? Do you create an aesthetically pleasing design? For what purpose?
"This is the livery of McLaren," he insisted, "it's always been a combination of these colours, and it will only change for commercial reasons. It won't change just to make a few people in the company happier because they want it orange, or they want it yellow.
"We tried to put a bit more of our real colour, which is day-glo… fluorescent red is our colour. We've got more heritage in fluorescent red than any other colour. But again what I prefer to do is put a stylish design and as we evolve. It will be far more recognised if we suddenly come out with a light green car for the following reason, you'll all go, yeah they've got a big amount of money coming in."
When it was pointed out that the chrome colour of the car seemingly reflects previous partner Mercedes as opposed to new partner Honda, he snapped: "The car's got a minimal amount of mirroring on it, I wouldn't even call it silver.
"Yes we could change colour," he concluded, "yes we could do something more daring, we could all these things, but give me a reason why? And if it's just to be aesthetically more pleasing, that's not enough reason to me."
Check out our gallery, here.