McLaren alert to ‘poisoned biscuits’ threat from rivals after F1 title success

Andrea Stella is wary of "poison biscuits" being thrown McLaren's way in F1 2025.
McLaren’s rise to the top of F1 means rival teams may attempt to disrupt the new World Champions next year, with what has been dubbed “poisoned biscuits”…
Having secured its first World Championship victory since 1998, McLaren will have to fend off metaphorical “poison biscuits” in F1 2025, believes team boss Andrea Stella.
Andrea Stella: McLaren won’t pick the ‘poisoned biscuits’
The team’s first world championship win in 26 years, and the first title of any description since Lewis Hamilton’s victory in 2008, means the Woking-based squad is now wary of other teams attempting to divide and conquer by using disruptive tactics.
Stella laughed when asked about the metaphorical “poison biscuits” that has been used as an internal term at Woking, expressing surprise that the dialogue regarding the tactic had leaked outside of the walls of the McLaren Technology Centre.
The term is understood to refer to attempts from other outfits at sowing the seeds of disharmony amongst the ranks via morsels of information being leaked to the media, or seeking to engage in external disruption.
The message, which has been spelled out to the staff at the MTC, will be crucial to continuing the team’s success into the immediate future, Stella reckons, as he spoke to media – including PlanetF1.com – shortly after the chequered flag in Abu Dhabi.
“Refusing the poison biscuits is one of the fundamental elements of checking and validating that the culture that we have created is not only words, but exists in real life,” Stella said.
“We will always have poison biscuits dropped in our camp. We will always have poison biscuits dropped and, with an attempt to create division, to break the cohesion that we have in the team.
“But we talk every day that we are not going to pick the poisoned biscuits.
“It would be very naive, it would be very arrogant to think that, because we have achieved something now, ‘Now we are perfect, now we can relax, now we can think that everything is due’, just because we are World Champions.
“There’s nothing new – I think the best philosophy is that you start as if you had lost and that’s what we’re going to do in preparation for next season.”
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Stella settled into the role of team boss at McLaren with aplomb, having succeeded Andreas Seidl after the 2022 season, with the former Ferrari engineer making a move to immediately overhaul the technical department of the Woking squad.
In his eyes, the success that is now being achieved is down to the empowerment being given to the staff, unlocking the potential of the talent inside the team’s halls.
“The unlocking [of the potential] of the people, first of all, is not only my contribution, I’ve talked before of contribution of the management and this is extremely important because you cannot do anything if you are a one-man show,” he said.
“Even if you are team principal, you need the support of your CEO, you need the support of the chairman, you need the support of the shareholders – we need to go aligned, otherwise you don’t create a culture.
“I’ve always felt in my position as team principal, great support. And we deployed our shareholders work in the factory, walking the factory.
“Zak walks the factory with me very, very often and we have several conversations.
“Ultimately, it is the accumulation of these numerous, numerous conversations that change the culture, and build trust in an organisation.
“You see that as a team principal, as a CEO, you are one of us, and, thanks to our conversation, we build the way we want to be as a group.
“And then we become the guarantee that the way we want to be as a group will be implemented — that’s where you really make a difference as a team principal or a CEO.
“Not because you bring new staff, but because what we agree all together will be guaranteed. We are responsible for making sure that this is brought to life.”
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