In 1998, McLaren fell foul of an in-season rules change as the FIA clamped down on the team’s ‘fiddle brake’, which was discovered by an eagle-eyed photographer. A cunning (and cheap!) slice of ingenuity created by McLaren in 1997 was banned in early ’98, just as its MP4/13 had begun life in dominant fashion, with a second brake pedal having been discovered in the cockpit. In 1997, McLaren came up with the idea for a unique brake-steer system, later dubbed a ‘fiddle brake’ by Ferrari ‘s Ross Brawn, in which the drivers could brake just one of the rear wheels at a time, reducing understeer dramatically.
It was a simple concept, with the independently operated rear brakes allowing the drivers to get back on the power earlier while continuing to brake the appropriate wheel behind them, but it was quickly discovered – although not by the FIA. McLaren told the story of the controversial technology on its website in 2017, where McLaren’s chief engineer Steve Nichols recounted how the idea came about. “I had this idea to put a rear brake on in the corners, to sort of dial out the understeer,” he said, speaking about the 1997 MP4/12.
“Paddy Lowe was head of R&D at the time, and this would be considered an R&D project. So I told him I wanted to try this thing where we have an extra pedal in the car, and we put the right-rear or left-rear brake on to balance the car. Eventually, he sanctioned the project.
It sat on the test truck for months waiting to be tested,.