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The McLaren MP4-17 was the car with which the McLaren team competed in the 2002 Formula One season and the 2003 Formula One season. It was driven by David Coulthard and Kimi Räikkönen who replaced Mika Häkkinen who retired last season.
The team did not perform as well as expected due to mechanical failures, eventually finishing third in the constructors championship with 65 points.
Using a development version of the car, the MP4-17D, the 2003 season started very promisingly with wins at the two first grands prix of the year, one each for Coulthard and Räikkönen. However, rival teams soon caught up as McLaren was sidetracked by the development of the McLaren MP4-18, a radical new design which due to reliability problems never raced in anger. As a result, the team gradually fell slightly further back as the season progressed, with rivals able to develop their newer cars more quickly. However, despite this setback, Räikkönen finished in the points consistently and challenged Michael Schumacher for the championship all the way up to the very last race, eventually losing the title by only 2 points. The team also finished third in the constructors championship with 142 points just two points behind WilliamsF1.
