Lando Norris says from halfway point of the F1 2023 season he started to feel more confident in the car after having to adapt in MCL60.
It was not an overall smooth start to McLaren’s campaign in F1 2023 which also hurt Norris at the beginning. But his situation was not just about the car not being good enough, it was also a case of him not being 100% in the MCL60.
He did secure results wherever possible but post the second half, he was on a different spectrum. He was always around Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and in Brazil, he even left the field behind while staying on with the Dutchman on his back.
He does regard Brazil as the strongest of all but it didn’t come easy as Norris notes of having to adapt to the car as the season progressed. His form got better and better as the season went on. McLaren’s strong update only added an icing to the cake.
But he agrees on making mistakes in qualifying which hurt in couple of races especially in Qatar where seemingly lost sprint to teammate Oscar Piastri. “I think any time we’ve been close to getting a victory the last six or seven races, I’ve had six P2s [this year] and all have them [have been] behind Max, no other driver,” said Norris.
“So anytime out of those times something might have gone wrong, we were in the perfect position. Like Brazil was one of my best races. I mean, it may not look like it just from there was not a lot going on but in terms of the gap to everyone else and just one car ahead, I think was a pretty good race. Mexico was a very good race, so I think I’ve definitely been at my best in terms of performance, maybe not the beginning of the year.
“But I worked quite a bit on trying to adapt to this car, because it’s not an easy car. And so there’s things every weekend that I struggle with, but I spent the first part of the season maybe not in the right space. How I want to drive quickly is the opposite of how this car wants to be driven. And still my natural thing of going out and driving qualifying as best as I want is not how the car needs to be driven.
“So I still have to change a little bit how I have to drive the car. And that’s still been happening this year. But since the halfway point this season I felt more confident, I felt like I have been getting the car especially from a racing perspective to get the most out of the car. I have just made too many mistakes in qualifying which has been obvious and I have acknowledged but I definitely think that I have had some best of my races ever done.
“So that helps when you have a good car to go with you and I believe as I have said many times before that I believe McLaren can turn things around and I think this was the year that we needed and the team needed to kind of prove those things which I think is perfect,” summed up Norris.
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