McLaren will be in position to attack for Sprint victory in Austria as Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri start 2nd and 3rd on Saturday afternoon.
The British driver did two laps on the mediums in SQ1 as his initial lap was not the best, although it was more than good enough for the next session. He was P4. In SQ2, he was a step behind teammate Oscar Piastri but made it through in P7.
When they switched to the softs, Norris put a strong lap together as he joined Max Verstappen on the front row.The 24-year-old was satisfied with his day’s work in the end.
“I think reasonably good, to be honest. I never got quite comfortable probably until my final lap, so I’m happy with that.
“[It was] close, as it has been the whole year, so no difference. It must have been a nice lap by Max. A good position for the race tomorrow.”
Norris is pretty confident he can fight the Dutchman for the victory tomorrow on the basis of FP1 and Sprint qualification.
“From what we see at the minute, yes. But otherwise, I’m not sure.”
Following a terrible weekend in Spain where he had no pace and struggled with car set-up on his way to P7, Oscar Piastri returned to form on Friday and lines up 3rd for the 24-lap Sprint race.
The 23-year-old Aussie had been the quicker McLaren in SQ2 but made too many errors on his SQ3 attempt.
Nonetheless, Piastri is pleased to be back to his old self after the problems of Spain.
“I think the position is quite good, obviously, but last lap was… a couple of corners I could tidy up.
“I think it’s nice to at least know where the time is.
“Obviously [it was] a bit of a rough one last weekend, and so I feel like we’re back on the pace and, yeah, new front wing was working well.”
Like his teammate, he’s hopeful they can take the fight to Verstappen.
“I think so.
“The gap to Max is not massive, and I know there were a couple of big mistakes on that lap, so I think we’re definitely in the mix.”
