Lando Norris feels his pole lap in Austin was the best time of his career, but he feels the pace of the top cars heading into the race is “closer than people think.”
Norris took pole position at the United States Grand Prix on Saturday, three-hundredths of a second ahead of title rival Max Verstappen, but the session was halted late on when George Russell crashed at Turn 19.
Lando Norris names US GP pole position as ‘career best’
Additional reporting by Elizabeth Blackstock
Norris revealed that there were set-up changes for McLaren between the early sprints and qualifying, which helped his cause, but added that he was “still struggling quite a bit” with his best laps.
Geared up for a close race, the Briton is looking forward to lining up on the front row with Verstappen on Sunday and resuming his battle for the front seat with Verstappen.
“It was probably the best of my career,” Norris told media such as PlanetF1.com after qualifying. “Yes, it was a great lap.
“On the second lap I thought, ‘Guys, I don’t think we can improve much here,’ so I set the bar a little too high. So I took everything out of the car.
“Today we changed quite a bit from a sprint race to qualifying and definitely took a step forward, but I was still struggling a lot.
“So I thought I had to take a little bit more of a risk and give a little bit more and it worked out perfectly. But it was never the same lap and I never thought I would be here today. I’m very glad that I didn’t.
“I think we’re still a little bit behind, but we’re in a good position. In fact, I think our pace for Max yesterday and today was probably a little more similar.
“We probably expected Ferrari and Mercedes to be a little bit faster today, but maybe they just got out of the car a little bit earlier in the weekend and were able to take another big step from the sprint to now.” .
“So we might have caught up a little bit, but it’s going to be a tough race. I mean, the Ferraris were very fast in today’s race because of the degradation.
“Max is Max. Max is Max and I always said they were going to be fast, so I’m really excited. I think it’s going to be a good fight and probably a good fight to watch.”
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When asked further about the idea that McLaren were off the pace compared to Red Bull this weekend, Norris said that despite the widespread belief that the MCL38 was coming, the team had He explained that it wasn’t the fastest car. To be the best all-rounder on the grid at the moment.
“People are probably going to hate me when I say this, but I don’t think so…we’ve definitely had the best car in some of the races and we’ve had quite a few this year as well in the last couple of months. There were some races, but definitely not all races,” Norris explained.
“Singapore, I think I can say with confidence, we were the best. Baku, the race before that, Oscar (Piastri) won, but he won because he drove better than the other guys. I think Red Bull and Ferrari were also fast.
“People may disagree with that, but that’s our version of what happened. That’s what we think as a team. That’s what we believe. So two races ago Going back to , we weren’t the fastest machine.
“Last time we were in Singapore, the perception changed because of something that happened. When you are in a team and you actually know where you stand, where you are compared to other teams. When I can say these things with confidence, I can say where I believe we are and where we are not.
“Sometimes I make mistakes, and today was the same, but my lap was very good. I couldn’t have run a tenth of a second faster than today’s lap, and it probably could have been faster. It’s hard to know exactly where it’s struggling a little more, although it shows that it’s not that fast.
“There are various reasons. A little bit of bottoming out and the ride quality at high speeds is something we struggle with compared to Red Bull, but compared to Ferrari their slowness is unbelievable.
“And even back in Singapore where we had the upper hand, I think Ferrari were very fast all weekend leading up to qualifying. They made some mistakes.
“I think in the final stint, Charles (Leclerc) was the fastest car on the track with the hard tires on. So I just need to know the information before making any specific comments, and I think we dominated the weekend for a few weeks. Despite what we did, it’s very close and I think it’s closer than people think.
“And this is an area where we’re not that fast and maybe other people are a few steps ahead and it’s a little different. There’s no exact answer, we’re just driving the car. But… It’s just my feeling and it’s kind of our feeling as a team.”
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