Formula One news

Dennis confirms McLaren drivers keep equal status

McLaren team boss Ron Dennis is still standing behind both of his race drivers. He will treat them with equal status and there will not be a number one driver this season in his team he confirmed. Fernando Alonso hoped to have become the team's first driver but the team wants both drivers to keep an equal status and fight for the championship title.

Speaking about the driver's status Ron Dennis told The Times: "It is something that I've always had in racing teams that I've operated because, to me, it is entirely logical to have a policy where you are striving to give each driver equal treatment - that means equality in everything. "It is just completely logical to try to field the two most competitive cars and be able to internally defend, in a scientific and practical way, a challenge from one driver to the team saying the team isn't fair. I think fairness is a key factor in sport.

"The easy option at the beginning of the season would have been to nominate a No 1 and a No 2. The problem with that is that the whole team becomes out of balance because the mentality of the people on the cars becomes 'A team, B team' and that is just not an environment which grows the team."

In the end it's a great position for the team to have two drivers that can fight with each other. "Most times, the problem doesn't exist because one driver is normally better then the other," Dennis said. "And how could anyone imagine that I would be in the situation I'm in, where both drivers have a very similar work ethic and a very similar approach to how they race and how they optimise their cars? There is an inevitability that they are going to look at each other and have a view which they express to me."

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