His work with the McLaren's F1 team lasted only a year, when he was placed in charge of the organisation's driver development programme.

The team began racing in 1998, with then McLaren test-driver Nick Heidfeld and Nicolas Minassian driving.

Even though Leinders had qualified 19th, he did not take the start of the race in order to give Heidfeld a chance at winning the title after being pushed down the grid for fuel irregularities.

West Competition retained Nick Heidfeld for 1999 and brought in Brazilian Mario Haberfeld to replace Minassian who moved on to the new Kid Jensen Racing team.

With champion Heidfeld leaving for the Prost F1 team at the end of his title year, West Competition signed Stéphane Sarrazin and Tomáš Enge for the 2000 season.

Principal David Brown also left McLaren at this time, opting to return to race engineering with the Jordan team.