Lando Norris has branded his United States Grand Prix weekend a “momentum killer” as his Formula 1 title chances took a dent with a points loss to Max Verstappen.
Norris went into the Austin round 52 points down on Verstappen but with the momentum in his sails amid McLaren‘s emergence as the benchmark side over Red Bull.
However, the Briton was unable to make up more crucial ground as Verstappen being classified ahead in the Sprint and Grand Prix saw him add five points to his lead.
Norris overtook Verstappen on track in the main race, but the pass occurred outside track limits and a time penalty saw the two swap places with the Dutchman third.
With Verstappen holding a 57-point lead with five rounds remaining, Norris has conceded that he has encountered a considerable setback to his championship hopes.
Asked how damaging his most recent result was to his title prospects this season, Norris told media including Motorsport Week: “Quite a bit. It’s a momentum killer.
“But it is kind of, we came in here with our mind open, not expecting to dominate or just win or anything.
“The fact that Ferrari were so quick today showed they’re just as competitive.
“Even if I came around Turn 1 in first, I would never have finished first or second, and could only have finished third.
“But the one guy I need to beat is Max, and that’s the guy I didn’t beat today. So it was an unsuccessful weekend all in all.
“But we gave it a good shot. I tried. It wasn’t good enough, and we have work to do, and I have work to do on myself.”
McLaren explains COTA regression
McLaren proved not to be as competitive in the United States as it had been prior to the autumn break when Norris produced a dominant 21-second win in Singapore.
However, McLaren boss Andrea Stella has admitted that the team had expected a more challenging outing based on the Circuit of the Americas‘ track characteristics.
“Compared to Singapore, here there’s quite a lot more low-speed braking into low-speed corners, plus wind, and we know that in these conditions, not necessarily our car performs at the best,” he explained.
“It is not as good as in some medium speed corners, low wind conditions, which we had in Singapore, we had in Zandvoort, and we had in Hungary.
“We know that these three venues that I’ve just mentioned do suit our car, but here I would have expected this event to be the most difficult of the remaining six events.”
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