Lando Norris says that McLaren’s “one big problem” in 2022 is its lack of downforce compared to rival teams.
McLaren endured a difficult season-opening weekend last time out in Bahrain, struggling in both qualifying and the grand prix.
It walked away with zero points to its name and an understanding that the MCL36 was not in competition with those towards the front of the field.
Norris says that diagnosing the team’s problem has been “simple”, stating it is not generating enough downforce through corners.
“Downforce, overall grip,” Norris said when asked what the issues in Bahrain were. “It’s quite a simple thing.
“There’s quite a few times when the balance has been in a decent place. If the balance is in a decent place but you’re just slow, it’s quite a simple thing of what you need.
“There’s not loads of problems, just one big problem, which is very costly in the world of Formula 1.
“All you need is downforce and that’s what we’re struggling with at the minute. That’s what we need to work on.”
Norris explained that McLaren felt positive after a strong outing at the pre-season shakedown in Barcelona, however it failed to make progress beyond then, while other teams made strides forward.
“What confused us initially was the fact that we were a little bit stronger in Barcelona and I think we just started off with a decent car,” he said.
“We just didn’t make a lot of progress because of the car which went on to the track very well, we understood how to optimise the car very quickly.
“But then we couldn’t make much further progress from there, that’s where other teams were able to take steps forwards and continue to find out more about the car and make bigger steps than we could.
“There was more hope after Barcelona but that went away with time and when everyone else was able to find out more about the car and bring upgrades, we took some steps back.”
