Lando Norris qualified third for tomorrow’s F1 Chinese GP, one-and-a-half tenths adrift of team-mate Oscar Piastri on pole position, who he claims just did a better job in handling a McLaren that is “definitely” the quickest car, but “tricky” to handle over the course of a full lap around Shanghai.
Norris bounced back in qualifying for the main event after having a difficult Sprint in which he could only manage eighth place – a mistake in qualifying left him down in sixth on the grid for the 19-lap race, and a brief off a turn six on the opening lap meant he lost out three places and could only recover one, re-overtaking Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin late on to score a singular point.
Norris admits to have made “too many mistakes”
But despite a good qualifying for the grand prix itself and a “much better” feeling compared to the Sprint portion of the weekend, Norris still admitted to be struggling with the balance in his MCL39, as he explained the difficulties he had putting a whole lap together meant he made “too many mistakes”:
“I mean, it was tricky for everyone, I think. It’s just tight and close, but it was a much better job than we did and I did [on Friday],” said Norris. “So the car was feeling much better and yeah, I was feeling definitely more comfortable.
“[But] still [there were] too many mistakes from my side. I’m not as comfortable as I was in Australia. [It’s] just tricky, but it is for everyone, and I just haven’t done the best job, and Oscar [Piastri] has done a very good job, so still a good result. I’m happy with P3, yeah.”
McLaren is “definitely quickest”, but “tricky” to understand
When quizzed further on what exactly is holding him back around Shanghai compared to his imperious weekend last time out in Melbourne, Norris pointed out the differences in circuit characteristics, and a general lack of confidence in his car to consistently produce the kind of headline sector times the McLaren is capable of – but ultimately admitted he just didn’t execute his lap as well as his Australian team-mate:
“The layout is very different here to Australia, much more medium-speed, high-speed corners. There’s some slow speed too.
“That and just the car. We’ve said it many times, it’s definitely the quickest car, but it’s still tricky to drive,” said Norris. “We can easily do good sectors every now and then, but putting a lap together – even like Oscar said, he was two tenths down and then he’s kind of going for it and it stuck.
“But it seems just tricky to understand how to do it consistently enough. When you do that kind of good job, then it can easily be the quickest car. So a couple of things, and just more my driving, just that rhythm of knowing exactly what to do where, how much.
“Also, when you have the tyres and if you push a bit too much, the tyres can bite quite quickly too.
“So many different things, but also just Oscar’s done a good job and I’ve not done a perfect job. It’s tight, so I just paid the price for not doing well enough.”
“Long night ahead” with concerns over tyre graining for Sunday
After failing to make any significant progress when in traffic during the Sprint race, the championship leader is concerned he’s got a “long night ahead” trying to understand how to better deal with the front-limited nature of Shanghai and manage the tyres in dirty air during the grand prix, as he lines up behind not only Piastri, but also Mercedes’ George Russell, who produced a stunning last-gasp effort to take a front row start, just eight hundredths off the pole time:
“I think Oscar’s shown great pace. I definitely haven’t, especially from the race pace. And whenever we struggle with front graining, it’s something I just struggle with a lot personally. So yeah, difficult for me.
“It’s been therefore a difficult weekend, just trying to deal with those things. It’s something I’m not strong enough in.
“I’ve got a long, long night ahead of me to sit down and go through the data and see what I can improve for tomorrow.”
After the Sprint, Norris leads the championship by just two points from Max Verstappen, who out-scored the McLaren by five points in the shorter race.
