Lando Norris says the conditions of qualifying provide the platform for McLaren to mask the deficiencies its 2023 Formula 1 car upholds.
McLaren has endured a disappointing start to the 2023 campaign, registering only 17 points across the opening seven rounds of the year to lie fifth in the standings.
Although both Norris and team-mate Oscar Piastri excelled in qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix to wound up third and 10th respectively, the pair were unable to translate promising starting positions into a points haul of any description on Sunday.
Norris, whose Sunday hopes were curtailed by opening lap contact with Lewis Hamilton, says that the extra grip afforded by a fresh set of tyres and low fuel neglect the problems McLaren has consistently struggled with in race trim this year.
When asked if McLaren’s Saturday showing in Barcelona provided a glimmer of hope, Norris said: “Yeah. We know there are strengths. New tyres, low fuel, everything always feels better, especially Barcelona, a new set of tyres versus a used set of tires was like eight-tenths almost.
“Eight-tenths of grip that you get extra from the tyres, so it masks a lot of the issues that we have. Even if you look at our second lap on a tyre pace, it was a lot, lot worse than our first lap. Even after one lap, we struggle a lot more than we do on that very first lap.
“So a new tyre just makes everything better, simple as that. The car can combine more, it can do a lot more with everything. And that’s when things come together.
“I think we understand why, and how it affects the car, and what things are a lot better and so on. It’s just trying to get that feeling of what a new car does bring you into the actual balance and performance of the car itself, whether it’s mechanically or aerodynamically and so on. That’s the challenging part.”
Having already unveiled a vast upgrade package to the Azerbaijan Grand Prix at the end of May, McLaren is set to introduce further updates ahead of the summer break.
While Norris asserts the Woking squad is attempting to extract everything from its current package, the Brit isn’t anticipating a sudden upturn in form until new parts arrive.
“There’s little things we’re still trying to improve, from an aerodynamic side, from race pace side, the 23-year-old explained. “I think it was clear, as a trend, we do struggle a bit more in a race comparing to qualifying.
“So we’ve got some figuring out to try and do from that side. But I’m not expecting any easy races or anything like that until we get some more bits on the car.”
Despite the team’s struggles throughout the year, Norris contends that the data has shown the MCL60 to be one of the better-performing cars in high-speed corners.
Nevertheless, Norris underlines that cornering performance is not the only issue the team needs to resolve to improve its competitive standing, citing that he still sustains feelings inside the cockpit that he did during his rookie F1 year in 2019.
“Long corners are definitely a lot worse. But for us, high-speed corners are the best. High-speed corners, we’re actually very competitive,” he revealed.
“High-downforce, low-downforce. High-speed I’d say we’re close to being one of the best on the track. But the opposite in the slow-speed corners in a way.
“Like if you take the last sector in Barcelona, Turn 10, Turn 12, it just was a disaster for us. It’s so painful. But here, it’s different things. It’s not just the fact it was a long corner. It’s how you’re able to drive corners, how you’re able to release the brake, that we just don’t have. That’s not good either.
“It’s not just that we’re missing 20 points of downforce on the front, 20 points on the rear. It’s the handling, the characteristics of the car that we also need to fix in some ways.
“There are feelings that I have in the car that we’ve had for the last five years and haven’t changed.
“So trying to still understand all of these and actually make a difference, that’s what we need if we want to compete and be a better team.”
