The duo started at McLaren on January 1 following extensive periods of gardening leave away from their former teams.
Marshall, in particular, was a major coup, leaving Red Bull after 17 years of service, most recently as chief technical officer to take over the role of technical director, engineering and design, with McLaren.
After 11 years with Ferrari, Sanchez has returned to McLaren as technical director, car concept and performance. From 2007 to 2012 he served as a senior aerodynamicist and aerodynamics team leader.
Marshall and Sanchez are seen as the last two pieces of Stella’s technical jigsaw after taking on the team principal role at the start of last year and guiding McLaren into a healthy challenging position it now aims to build on this season.
Although only a few weeks into their new positions, Stella can already see the impact they are having.
“In terms of the organisation of the technical team, they fill roles that were already there,” said Stella.
Take the short survey.
“The structure has always been with three technical directors. One on aerodynamics, Peter Prodromou; one on performance concept, David Sanchez, and then engineering and design (Marshall) that makes all the ideas generated in aero, and with performance and concept, become parts of the car.
“So that was the structure, that was the vision, and now we have filled in all the positions with David and Rob starting.
“Definitely what we can see in the first few weeks is that they come with quite a lot of knowledge, which is no surprise as they’ve been part of great teams, great projects.
“The good thing is that this knowledge of things integrates with what we know, with our know-how. It’s not like, (they are saying) ‘We should do things this way, which is the opposite of what you do’. (Instead, it is), ‘We can do things this way, which adds a little to what you do’. This was quite refreshing, in a way.
“We have also had the possibility to appreciate their personal approach, which I think has engaged people in fascinating technical conversations, so we see the momentum, the energy, the ideas that flow through the organisation.”
Those assets are crucial for McLaren as it tackles what Stella sees as a three-pronged project given what is in store for all the F1 teams over the next two years, not least in 2026 when new power unit regulations come into force.
Stella added: “Speaking more practically, we need to think that right now – and this is not only at McLaren, but certainly is in any other team – we have the 2024 car, and then we are already setting the basis for evolving the ’24 onto the ’25.
“Then there’s the 2026 project, with completely new technical regulations, so there’s so much work that we need to go through, and it is very important to have this high calibre (of people) leading their respective technical areas.
“It means we have the capacity, the capability, the competence to approach these three big projects with the horsepower required to compete at the top of Formula 1.”
The team has already unveiled its livery for this year, with the MCL38 due to be revealed on February 14.
Discussion about this post