McLaren are one of the biggest and most established names in F1.The team has been around since 1963 when a New Zealander by the name of Bruce McLaren setup the McLaren team and were called Bruce McLaren Ltd. In 1968 Bruce McLaren won the team it's first race in Belgium, they also finished 2nd in the constructors championship that year.
1970 brought the unfortunate death of Bruce whilst testing a Can-Am car at the Goodwood circuit. This devastated the team, but they pulled it together and did well in most of the formula's they were competing in that year, including F1.
The team won their first constructors and drivers championship in 1974 with Emerson Fittipaldi driving.
In 1981 the McLaren team and Project 4 (Ron Dennis' personal F2 team) teams merged to create the current McLaren team (this is also where the MP4-XX chassis numbering originates from). The then revolutionary (the first carbon fiber composite chassis) John Barnard designed MP4/1 (and it's succesors) and the Porsche Turbo charged engine dominated the early part of the 1980's winning the 1984 Niki Lauda took the drivers and constructors championships and then in 1985 Alain Prost won both the titles with the McLaren team, he also won the Drivers championship in 1986, although the team lost the grip it had on the constructors crown to the Williams team.
In 1988 McLaren managed to get Honda to move their engine supply from Williams to them, this lead to a very dominant season where the team lead all but 27 lap's and won 15 of the 16 races. Ayrton Senna took the Drivers and Constructors championship for the team. 1989 was the year the Honda switched from being turbo charged to 3.5ltr normally aspirated. The team took both titles again, with Prost just pipping Senna to the Drivers crown in Japan after an accident involving both cars ended the Senna charge.
Prost left the Woking team to join Ferrari in 1990, but Senna had his revenge wining both the 1990 and 1991 championships for the team.
Honda left F1 in 1992 after the dominance shown by the Renault Williams team. This left McLaren without an engine and they moved to the Ford Cosworth engine. The engine seemed usable enough in the hands of Senna but Michael Andretti struggled with the move from Indy to F1, being replaced toward the end of the season with Mika Häkkinen replacing him.
1984 saw the end of Senna at McLaren as he moved over to the Williams team. The new face at the McLaren team was Martin Brundle who joined Mika Häkkinen in the then Peugot powered cars. The Peugot power plant proved both under powered and un reliable, so the following year a switch was made to the Mercedes Benz engine. The MP4-10 however radical it may have been in design, proved to be slow on the track, and for Nigel Mansell it was a tight squeeze to fit in (he retired from F1 after 2 races in the car). In fact the only memorable thing to happen to the team at this time was the change from Marlboro sponsorship to West, bringing in the 'Silver Arrows' design that the Mercedes engine supplier was more than happy with.
The 1997 and 1998 seasons were far better for the team. Not maybe in race or title wins, but clear progress was being made by the team in all fronts. The Ilmore team (the people behind the Mercedes engine) where getting to grips with the demands of F1, showing there ability to use very clever composite material's (e.g. Beryllium, which has since been banned from F1 due to expense) and unique ways of overcoming legislation being placed on the engine design. McLaren also signed the talented Adrian Newey to try catch up in the aero design wars.
In 1998 it all seemed to come together for the team, Renault withdrew from engine supply leaving the Mercedes-Ilmore engine to be one of the most powerful on the grid, and the aero package seemed to work a treat. This coupled with some genuinely talented drivers in the form of Mika Häkkinen and David Coulthard (who's development skills proved exemplary) allowed the team to win 9 of the GP's that year, and Mika Häkkinen won the Drivers championship with a 100 point tally and the team won the Constructors championship as well. Mika Häkkinen also won the 1999 drivers championship, but the team was overhauled by 2 very impressive Ferrari cars to the Constructors championship.
The 2000's are a little worse for the team, as the Ferrari dominance affected not only the McLaren team, but all the teams on the grid. There are however some good point's. The MP4-18 was a radical Newey designed car that never raced due to reliability issues. Most of the car got used however in the MP4-19 of the following year (2004), but although the car shone in some cases, proved almost impossible to setup, and my mid 2004 the MP4-19B was introduced. Although the MP4-19B was a development of the MP4-19, it bore almost no resemblance to the previous car, it did however prove more reliable and certainly had glimpses of speed.
New for the 2005 season was Columbian Juan Pablo Montoya, who had shown his Senna'esq driving ability in Cart the previous year winning his rookie season. He joined the team with Kimi Räikkönen and they both proved fast in the new MP4-20. The car was undoubtedly faster than the winning Renault but reliability proved to be the struggling point for the team.
