McLaren is off to a great start with Lando Norris qualifying on Pole for F1’s 2025 Australian GP. Norris took pole from McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri, securing a front-row lockout for the team.
Norris’s fastest time, 1:15.096, put him almost a tenth ahead of Piastri in P2 and stunningly almost 4 tenths ahead of defending Champion Max Verstappen.
However, qualifying didn’t run as smoothly as the result may suggest, with Norris struggling on his first lap in Q3.
The Briton even got his lap time deleted for venturing off track after taking too much risk.
On his second run, Norris put together a good lap, striking the perfect balance between taking risks and keeping it clean.
Norris on struggles in qualifying
During the official press conference following Qualifying for F1’s 2025 season opening Australian GP, Norris reckons that it is the ‘perfect way’ to head into the season with McLaren.
“Good enough, I guess.
“Tricky because of my first lap and going off track. And just with how tight it’s been, especially with Oscar.
“But yeah, it’s a tough one because you want to take a lot of risks, especially on this track.
“It’s a track you’ve got to commit, and you’ve got to know what your target is, and once you’ve turned in, you’re hoping for the best in a lot of cases.
“So, it’s one way you want to take those risks.
“Obviously, I took too many on my first lap and got track limits.
“So, I was in a difficult position with knowing how much risk I want to take. But I put it together well.
“It was just a clean lap, no mistakes, and that was enough. So happy; I’m in a perfect way to start the season.”
Expectations for F1 2025 season
After McLaren turned their 2024 season around to win the Constructor’s title the expectations for the 2025 season were high.
Norris reckons that while they expected to be strong, McLaren didn’t necessarily think they would be quite as far ahead as the results would suggest, especially after struggling with one-lap pace throughout practice.
The 25-year-old commends the team for the ‘incredible job’ they have done to improve the car over the winter.
“I mean, we’ve been confident, just because our expectation is as much as we want to dominate and actually have a result like we’ve just had, it really was not necessarily our expectation to have a bit of a gap to the rest of the cars.
“So, I wouldn’t say have a gap. I mean, when we put the lap in, we had a bit of a gap, but it’s been difficult.
“I think one of our things has been how difficult it’s been in our car, just to execute those qualifying laps and to put things together, and that’s been some of the things I’ve struggled with this weekend.
“So, to have that kind of pace we had today was not unexpected, but we just weren’t going in thinking, OK, we’re going to have two tenths over everyone or one and a half tenths, whatever it was.
“So, we know we have a good car, mainly because I know I have a very good team around me, and everyone back at McLaren and MTC has done an incredible job, clearly, to keep the car going from last season and improve in as many areas as possible.”
Threat of rain ahead of the Australian GP
With rain threatening to disrupt the Australian GP come Sunday, Norris gave his thoughts on the pace of his McLaren in both wet and dry conditions.
After a strong showing in pre-season testing in Bahrain, Norris expects McLaren ‘to be pretty good” in Australia.
“I think it’s in a good place. I think we were decent in Bahrain, and I think we’re going to expect to be pretty good here.
“We were pretty good here last year, and that was with a much worse car.
“So, we’re going in with one target, clearly, which is to be at the top and to have two cars at the top.
“But the conditions are going to be unexpected, so we just have to go in prepared.
“That’s all we can really do.”
However, with rain looming, Norris expects a “tough” challenge due to the specific track characteristics at Abert Park.
“It’s very tough.
“I mean, it’s still cool, and it’s still a sketchy track just because you’ve got walls closed, and you can’t make a lot of mistakes around here.
“You pay the price very quickly.
“It’s a street circuit and you’ve got all these painted white lines, which are meant to be high grip, but they’re still very slippery when you’re going at speeds.”
“Definitely not easy. We did some wet running a couple of years ago, and it tests you. Excited.
“Nervous at the same time, but we know where we are, and we just have to keep our heads up.”
