Andrea Stella announced as McLaren Team Principal

British Formula One team McLaren have announced that their Executive Director of Racing Andrea Stella will be replacing Andreas Seidl as the Team Principal, starting from 2023.

Stella, who joined McLaren in 2015, served as Head of Race Operations and Performance Director before serving his role as Executive Director of Racing. He will be replacing Seidl, who has left to join Sauber as the CEO of Motorsports. Seidl himself is replacing Frédéric Vasseur at Sauber, who was announced as Ferrari’s team boss earlier in the day. 

Prior to joining McLaren, Stella spent more than a decade with Ferrari, where he served as Performance Engineer for Michael Schumacher and Kimi Räikkönen between 2002 and 2008 and then as Race Engineer for Räikkönen and Fernando Alonso between 2009 and 2015.

Andrea Stella, new F1 Team Principal, McLaren Racing, commented:

“I feel privileged to take on the Team Principal role as the next stage of being part of the McLaren F1 Team. I am grateful to Zak and the Shareholders for their trust in me and to all my colleagues and those who have supported me throughout my F1 career. We are realistic about the amount of work ahead of us to move back up the grid, but I am excited and encouraged that I am on this journey together with a team full of talent, experience, racing spirit and dedication. I look forward to working closely with each of them, Lando and Oscar, to together achieve great success and enjoy the journey.“

Zak Brown, CEO, McLaren Racing, added:

“I’m delighted that Andrea Stella will step into the Team Principal role and lead our F1 technical and operational programme. Andrea is a highly talented, experienced and respected member of our team with a strong track record of leadership and success in Formula 1. His move into this role is a great example of the strength in depth we have in our team, and I’m excited to be working more closely with him with a joint focus on moving up the grid and winning races.

“I’ve really enjoyed working with Andreas. He has provided great leadership for the team and has played a significant part in our F1 performance recovery plan and ongoing journey to return to the front of the grid. I thank him for the transparency throughout the process which gave us time to plan accordingly.“