Read time: 15.2 minutes

There are 62 people at McLaren today who were also here when we last won a Constructors’ Championship in 1998. Some were already ‘old hands’ at the time, having won titles with Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost, while others were relatively new additions, having only joined that season. But none of them expected to go another 26 years without winning the trophy.

A lot has changed in that time, including the entirety of the grid and seven of the teams, but also the world we live in. In 2024, photos and videos were captured in real-time via smartphones and posted across social media instantly, rather than living solely through print in newspapers and magazines or on the walls of fans. We also brought the Championship trophy back to our factory in Woking, which has not only been built in that time, but has celebrated its 20th anniversary in the 26 years since we last won.

We discussed those differences in length here - which also include the ways in which the sport is consumed and how we build our cars - but through all of those changes, 62 members of the team have remained a constant, and they can provide us with a unique insight into both Championship wins.

As they returned to work in January as F1 Constructors’ Champions for the first time in over two decades, we sat down with a selection of them to look back on the victories, what it meant to them, and how they celebrated.

Down to the wire

Just like the 2024 Championship decider in Abu Dhabi, the ’98 season also went down to the final race, with Ferrari still mathematically able to beat us to the title in Japan. Our team was split between the race track, their own homes, and Planets Bowling Alley in Woking, which has sadly since shut down. It was much the same in 2024, with people working from the track and the McLaren Technology Centre, while those not on shift watched on from their homes or at watch parties in London and Woking.

“I was at Planets with my girlfriend, who’s now my wife,” Design Director Mark Ingham recalls of 1998. “It was very noisy, and the screens were small, so it was actually quite hard to follow the race.”

Again, there were parallels to 2024 in that there was drama at the start. In 2024, Oscar was hit by Max Verstappen, which dumped him at the back of the field and effectively ruled him out of contention. In 1998, fellow Championship contender Michael Schumacher stalled his Ferrari at the start and ended up at the back of the grid.

“We knew someone who lived in a flat in Woking, and he said he could hear the cheering coming from Planets when Schumacher stalled,” Yvonne Last and Joy Carver recall, both of whom work in the Payroll team. “It was one big, massive party.”

McLaren was a much smaller company at the time. Nowadays, all payslips are sent out electronically, but Joy can remember personally handing them out every month in 1998. “Everybody knew everybody,” she says.

With Schumacher dropping to the back of the grid, Ferrari’s already slim chances of snatching the title from our grasp had shrunk considerably. The Italian outfit needed a one-two, with both McLaren drivers failing to score. They were now looking at a McLaren one-two, with at least one of their drivers out of the points.

Mika went on to win the race, with Schumacher’s Ferrari teammate Eddie Irvine finishing in second, ahead of David Coulthard’s McLaren. At one stage in the race, Schumacher had managed to fight up to third, but a slow puncture ended his afternoon and Ferrari’s hopes of the title.

“It’s very difficult to explain what it’s like, being a part of a team that are World Champions,” Commercial Trackside Operations Director Mark Norris says. “There is nothing like the euphoria of being able to say that you are the best in the world.”

Let the celebrations begin

Mark Norris is the only member of the team who was working from the circuit for both events. After more than two decades of working trackside, Health & Safety Specialist Alan Field had switched to a factory-based role ahead of the 2024 season.

“It’s very, very special [to be able to say that], but I kept it very, very quiet,” Mark says with a smile.

Alan adds: “I really wanted to be there, I'm not going to lie. But I'm so thrilled that we’ve gotten back up the top again!”

1998 was Alan’s first season with McLaren. He was working in the Hospitality team at the time and saw us win the first two races of the 1998 season, before Schumacher took the third for Ferrari.

“We would always celebrate wins with champagne, but there was a rule that we had to hold back the bottles of champagne until the car passed the finish line, because it was seen as a bad omen. Once the win was confirmed, we would run, get the champagne out, and bring it back.

“I'll never forget the first race we didn't win... I didn't know what to do. At that point, I’d always run to get the champagne. We’d come second, which was still something, but I didn’t know what we did for that.” 

McLaren won nine of the 16 races that season, including the Championship-clinching season finale. Mark Norris and Alan can both vividly remember the celebrations from the circuit in Japan.

“The celebrations were very different [back then],” Mark Norris recalls. “We’d never do this now, but we’d start the engines up and rev them until they were destroyed. After which, you’d hear this big cheer in the paddock.

“Then afterwards, there was this famous place in Suzuka, a log cabin, which all the teams, sponsors, and drivers went to on the night we’d won the Constructors' Championship. Everyone was celebrating together, people were standing on the bar and on tables, and the floor of the log cabin was filled with beer. Not everyone was celebrating that we’d won the Championship, of course, but we were. That’s a great memory.”

Alan adds: “The champagne just flowed… and not necessarily inside a cup. It was everywhere. Everyone's tasting it, we’re all showered in it.”

Team Apparel Senior Manager Bobby Barratt was working for McLaren at the time, and whilst he probably wouldn’t have minded seeing his precious team kit soaked in champagne, there’s one part of the celebration he may have been less impressed to learn…

“The pocket of your shirt had your name embroidered onto it, and people were pulling the pockets off the shirts as a memento of the race,” Mark Norris recalls.  

Thankfully for Bobby, the shirts wouldn’t be reused the following season anyway. Only one item of clothing was definitely going to be carried over into the following season, and it was very nearly misplaced.  

“DC [David Coulthard] had sent back his kit bag one day and I pulled this pair of underpants out, which were threadbare,” he recalls. “I have a big clothes recycling bin, and I just chucked them in there and sent the kit out to the following race. I later got a call from David asking if I’d come across a pair of pants in the bag. ‘What, those threadbare things?’ I asked. ‘They’re not fit for anyone. What are you going to do with those? I think they belong in the V&A Museum’.

“He started laughing and explained that they were his lucky pants, which he had taken with him everywhere since karting, but had accidentally been left in his kit bag. As soon as I put the phone down, I was rummaging through all of this old kit. Thankfully, I dug them out of the bin and put them back in a plastic bag with a label saying, ‘Do not throw out. DC’s lucky pants.”

However, he was unlikely to have considered either of these things until the days after the event. Like many of his colleagues, Bobby was watching the race in the UK from Planets in Woking.

“Initially, you’re in shock,” he says. “It was the early hours of the morning, and I remember thinking, ‘Who can I phone and tell that we are World Champions?’ The daylight was only just breaking out. I was in a cab home afterwards, but I couldn’t tell anyone as it was far too early in the morning.

“When the team eventually got back, they then ran the car around Woking. The streets were lined with fans, it was an amazing experience.”

Ending a 26-year wait

In the 26 years of ups and downs since that 1998 Championship win, their relationships with and affinity for the team have only strengthened, as the wait for another Constructors’ title went on. 

There have been some tough seasons within that period, but also several near misses, and so when the 2024 Constructors’ Championship was finally sealed, emotions ran high.  

“It was so tense, I cried at the end when the car crossed the line, with relief and then the realisation at what we achieved. It was so tense, I cried at the end,” Mark Ingham recalls. This time around, determined to hear and follow the race more closely than in 1998, he had watched the race from home with his wife. “It was such a magic moment and so wonderful for the team – everyone has worked so hard for so long.”

Mark Norris adds: “After what happened between Max [Verstappen] and Oscar, I thought, ‘This isn’t going to go our way’. After the first lap incident, I couldn’t watch again until the final five laps. I couldn’t sit still. We were on the brink of doing something that we hadn’t for so long. It would put McLaren back to where McLaren should be, as a World Championship [winning] team, right at the front of the grid. To see Lando cross that line… tears of emotion? Yes. Tears of happiness? Yes. Tears of celebration? Yes. It's been a long time coming, and I'm glad to have been here for both.”

Through the highs and lows, the team never gave up and always believed we’d return to the top of F1’s table. Mark Ingham, who’s led the design team for more than a decade, has seen this firsthand.

“Even when we were struggling, the application was always there. The joy for me, is that everyone can see the difference they made. Everyone has worked so hard for so long and this is the validation of their work. Racing for a win is so different to racing for 10th place and a few points. Yes, it's more effort, it’s more demanding, more intense, but when it comes together… there’s much more joy.

“Andrea [Stella] has made the difference. There have always been a lot of very willing people, but he’s the one who unlocked this by putting things in place, and putting people in the right places, to make it happen.”

Yvonne adds: “It was more special because it’s felt like such a long time coming. Whereas, back in the ‘80s, you were a bit more blasé about it, because it was expected.”

Bobby says: “Lots has changed in the intervening years… I’ve married, bought a house, had a child, and so this time around, I watched it from home with my 11-year-old daughter. We were both nervously jumping up and down, we couldn’t sit still. When Lando crossed the line, there was an amazing sense of relief and pure joy. Back in the day, you maybe took it for granted, but we’d all waited so long. This time, I drank it in and appreciated it much more.

“You don’t actually know when the next one might come along, and so I said to my team, who are relatively young, to drink it in and enjoy the moment.”