McLaren’s Lando Norris has revealed that he is “relatively happy” with his pace after he finished second in Friday Practice for 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix.
Norris finished fourth in a rain-affected FP1 which was twice red flag but managed to find some unexpected dry-weather pace to finish second in FP2, despite McLaren having reportedly not expected to enjoy a strong weekend unlike at Silverstone where Norris finished second and briefly led the race at the start.
Speaking to www.mclaren.com post FP2, Norris revealed that he is “relatively happy” with his “overall” pace but added that he still has “some things to work on” in FP3, as he explained: “I feel like I’m not able to push quite as much as I would like in a few places on the track, so I think we’ve got a little bit more to unlock – but we’ve started off with a decent balance.”
The 23 year-old Brit nevertheless feels that McLaren’s upgrades have benefitted him in recent races as he continued: “I would say our improved pace since the upgrade has continued to help us and give the team confidence in some of the high-speed corners – but the slow-speed corners are still the ones we’re trying to focus on and improve.”
Norris’ teammate, Oscar Piastri meanwhile finished second in FP1 which he described as “very encouraging”, despite floor damage limiting him to a 19th-placed finish in the FP2 classification although the Aussie believes that he looks “very solid” going into FP3 and Qualifying.
Summing up his Friday practice, Piastri said: “I feel like I was in a reasonable place in both sessions, so I’m pretty happy with that. We look to have decent pace, so we’ll look into the data overnight and prepare for what tomorrow brings.”
McLaren Team Principal, Andrea Stella however iterated that Norris and Piastri managed to gather “some useful data,” despite two chaotic practice sessions, as the team prepare for a revamped “Alternative Tyre Allocation” Qualifying format, which sees the hard tyres used in Q1, medium tyres in Q2 and soft tyres in Q3.
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