“A lot of positives to take from France” Lando Norris pleased with progress despite Alpine moving to fourth in Constructor’s
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Lando Norris
In France, McLaren got double points for the fourth time this season, and also finished 7-9 for the second time in a row, after Austria. McLaren had a whole host of upgrades, and Lando Norris certainly made full use of it in qualifying, splitting the Mercedes drivers, and starting 5th.
Unfortunately for Norris, the position just was not sustainable during the race. George Russell was quite clearly faster, and so was Fernando Alonso, who had jumped the pair of them on the start. While Alonso had to concede to George Russell eventually, the Spaniard seemed to have a much better pace than Lando Norris and was able to stay in front.
Esteban Ocon finished ahead of Norris’s teammate Daniel Ricciardo, who finished 9th. This meant that Alpine now have a lead of 4 points against McLaren in the fight for fourth place in the Constructor’s Championship. Even if they have lost the lead, Lando Norris thinks that they have made progress in France.
Also Read: “I don’t believe a word he says”: Lando Norris believes Fernando Alonso is “playing mind games”
Lando Norris praises the team and the upgrades
In his interview posted on Formula 1’s official website, Lando Norris said that he was pleased with the team’s progress in France: “I think there’s still a lot of positives – it’s helped the car, it’s moved it in the right direction.”
He admitted that the upgrades didn’t work as well in the race as they had in qualifying: “Some of those improvements in balance that I seemed to have for yesterday, I lost today and went away from me, and I just didn’t have the same confidence in the car. Good work by the team; we’d have been a lot slower if we didn’t have [the upgrades].”
Alpine have seemed to have the edge on pace for the last few races, and they would likely already have jumped McLaren in the standings if Fernando Alonso did not suffer from a comically high amount of problems in the Austrian Grand Prix. From a DNS in the Sprint to a loose tyre after a pit stop, he experienced it all. However, in France, he had a much calmer weekend and kept ahead of Lando Norris comfortably.
Norris commented that: “I was trying to keep up with Fernando for the whole race, and pushing like hell the whole time. I was trying to save the tyres and push and save and push, whereas I felt like Fernando was chilling the whole race.”
His teammate, Daniel Ricciardo said that he had struggled with tyre management in France, which is why he fell into the clutches of Esteban Ocon. McLaren will hope for even better performance in Hungary, where Formula 1 heads to this week before the summer break begins.
Also Read: “I’m very happy with that, ” Lando Norris delighted after a P5 finish at the French GP Qualifying
Also Read: “Not a shock”: Lando Norris has a surprising reaction to McLaren’s porpoising issues in French GP
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Aniket Tripathi
(1002 Articles Published)