McLaren announced an engineering reshuffle on Thursday with Paddy Lowe promoted to the vacant role of the team's technical director.
Engineering director Lowe promoted to role of technical director
McLaren announced an engineering reshuffle on Thursday with Paddy Lowe promoted to the vacant role of the team's technical director.
Lowe had previously served as engineering director, a position which will now be filled by chief engineer Tim Goss.
Meanwhile, Neil Oatley remains as director of McLaren's design and development programmes.
Oatley joined McLaren in 1986 and in all the three men have 62 years of combined service at the team.
In a statement, McLaren said the reshuffle was expected to have numerous long-term benefits.
"Paddy will continue to lead our technical strategy in his own quietly authoritative way, but his new role will afford him even greater levels of focus as he will be spearheading new and innovative technical projects relating to our Formula One future," the team said.
Hard work
Lowe said he and Goss would alternate their attendances at races, with the season now extending to a record 20 rounds.
"It's very important to have senior technical management at the racetrack, because that's where you score the points, but, equally, if you spend all your time away then you risk overlooking some of the hard work that happens back at the factory," he said.
Goss had previously shared his workload with Pat Fry, who left last year to join rivals Ferrari as assistant technical director.
"Now I've taken on both roles but there's obviously been some shifting of responsibilities within the team as, clearly, I can't do the work of two people," he said.
"As director of engineering, my role will be to co-ordinate a small team of project engineers who are responsible for the specification, design and development of our cars."
McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button will help launch their 2011 chassis, the MP4-26, in Berlin on February 4.
