F1 News
Piastri and Norris not on the same page: 'I'm not massively surprised'
Lando Norris was downbeat and concerned after Friday practice during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend, but his teammate Oscar Piastri reports he had no such worries about McLaren's pace in Baku. The Australian qualified in P2 and will be the lead McLaren car by some distance at the start of the race because Norris failed to escape Q1.
The alarm bells were ringing for Norris on Friday. "We're quite a long way off. I'm having to push way too much to try and get a lap time out of it," the Brit explained to F1TV after the session. Norris' best time in FP2 wasn't shown on the timesheets because he was impeded on his fastest lap, but he was faster than his teammate in FP1.
Piastri and Norris not on the same page
After qualifying, Piastri was asked whether he had the same assessment about McLaren's performance. It turns out, he disagreed. "Honestly, I was pretty happy with it. We had a bit to find for sure. But I felt like we were in the ballpark," Piastri said.
"I'm not massively surprised to be sat here [in the top three]. I definitely didn't feel like we were the quickest yesterday [Friday]. But, again, I feel like it's so close between the top four teams that you never quite know who's going to come out on top. Red Bull were looking very quick at certain points. Ferrari obviously looking very quick. Even Mercedes at points as well. I always thought we were in a pretty good place," Piastri reported.
McLaren have the chance to end Red Bull's streak at the top of the Constructors' World Championship in Sunday's Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The Austrian team have sat at the top of the Championship standings since May 2022. McLaren need to outscore Red Bull by eight points to record the feat, and Piastri will be forced to pull most of the weight with Norris starting towards the back of the grid. Both Red Bull cars will start inside the top six.
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17 September 2024
