Norris plans to "overtake a couple of cars" in Austin F1 Sprint
Having only set the fourth-quickest time in yesterday's sprint qualifying, McLaren driver Lando Norris is intent on imrpoving his position in today's Austin F1 Sprint by "overtaking a couple of cars".
After his utterly dominant performance at the Singapore Grand Prix, Lando Norris appeared to struggle in the free practice and the sprint qualifying in Austion, and the British driver and his team didn’t seem to find many answers before all-important Friday session.
His struggles with his chrome-liveried MCL38 saw the three-time F1 race winner end up fourth on the grid, but he is far from giving up on a better result, pinning his hopes on a better race pace.
“A frustrating Sprint Qualifying this afternoon. My lap could have been cleaner, so I’m disappointed. We’ll look into it tonight and find the areas to work on ahead of tomorrow’s sessions.
"We’re in the mix though and within touching distance of the leaders with only a couple of cars to overtake, so that’s my plan for the Sprint with the aim of scoring strong points in our push for the Championship.”
His team-mate Oscar Piastri was knocked out in SQ1 after losing his lap time to track limits which meant that he’s failed to make SQ3 for the first time this season.
“It’s a shame to be out of Sprint Qualifying so early. Most of the lap was good, but I just made a few mistakes in the last sector. In the second to last corner, I tried to carry a bit too much speed and just exceeded the limits of the track.
"It’s a shame but one of the good things about Sprint weekends is that we have another chance to show our true pace tomorrow. It’s going to be tough to get back up into the points from where we are, but we’ll do what we can and try to secure some valuable points for the team.”
Reflecting on the qualifying session, McLaren team boss Andrea Stella hopes that his team will be able to fine-tune the MCL38 to close the gap to the field-leading outfits.
“The first weekend of this triple-header starts again with a very tight field, and four different teams in the first four positions after the Sprint Qualifying session. We didn’t have the smoothest day. Oscar had a lap deleted and was eliminated in SQ1 as a consequence.
"On Lando’s side of the garage, we were able to progress to SQ3 comfortably. He looked like he was on course to set a very competitive lap, but a couple of issues in the final sector pushed him down to P4.
"It’s still a good position from which to score points, and we’ve also gathered good information that will allow us to extract a little bit more from the car, while learning about the updates we have brought here to Austin.”
