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Stella explains why Norris did not go on softs for fastest lap

Stella explains why McLaren didn't pit Norris to improve fastest lap

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  • Matt Gretton
  • Editor-in-Chief

McLaren boss Andrea Stella has explained why McLaren didn't pit Norris late in the Grand Prix to give him a chance to improve his fastest lap time. Norris held onto the bonus point until late in the race, when Daniel Ricciardo took it from him. This didn't give the Australian a bonus point in the World Championship because he finished outside the top ten, but it did take it away from Norris.

Why did Norris not pit?

Norris had dominated the Grand Prix. At one point, Norris had a gap of almost half a minute. Norris ended up winning the Grand Prix by nearly 21 seconds. Could Norris has pitted for fresh soft tyres? Team boss Andrea Stella explained after the Singapore Grand Prix.

"No, in the second part of the second stint, our attention was drawn on the fact that as soon as you got behind the backmarkers, the car started to feel tricky," Stella said. "So it was all about no issues, no mistakes, no lock-up. We had seen already in practice that as soon as you are behind a slow car, things look like there’s something wrong with the car. It’s just the effect of the dirty air."

For the Woking-based formation, the focus was on bringing the MCL-38 home. "We suggested to Lando to have an attempt at the fastest lap, which he achieved, but, after that, we didn’t want to talk about fastest lap anymore," Stella said.

The gap is now at 52 points with six Grand Prix weekends remaining, including three sprints.

This article has been created in collaboration with Corwin Kunst.