McLaren team principal Andrea Stella doesn’t think Lando Norris could have done much better than seventh in Baku’s Formula 1 race after being stuck in traffic.
After a difficult qualifying in gusty conditions, Norris qualified a lowly seventh after looking fast all weekend, not helped by a slip-up in Turn 15 on his best Q3 lap.
On Sunday Norris couldn’t manage to move up, losing seventh to Charles Leclerc on a the lap five restart, which took him until the final stint to reclaim. His bid wasn’t helped by a slow tyre change, which dropped him behind a train of cars led by Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda.
Team principal Stella defended Norris’ race day performance, as he pointed out McLaren simply didn’t have the pace to clear the gaggle of cars Norris found himself in from the start.
“I think Lando had a strong race. He raced to the limit of the potential that was available in the car,” Stella said. “I think no other driver in Lando’s car could have scored more.
“We were hoping to have a car that was in condition to overtake, but the reality is that the car wasn’t fast enough to stay close to the car ahead out of last corner, to then be able to overtake down the straight. This means that Lando spent the entire race in traffic, despite feeling that the car had more to offer.
Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari, Lando Norris, McLaren
Photo by: Clive Rose / Getty Images
“If anything, the responsibility to try and extract more points may lay more on the team’s side, because with a fast pitstop we could have given Lando the opportunity perhaps to attack Lawson.”
With team-mate and title rival Oscar Piastri crashing out on the first lap, the Baku weekend was a huge opportunity for Norris to make a big swing at his 31-point deficit, with his seventh-place ultimately only earning him six points.
“If we just look with the lens of the drivers’ championship, obviously this was an opportunity to gain some points, like possibly it might have been yesterday in qualifying,” Stella conceded. “But, like I said, today we did not offer Lando a car that was in condition to progress through the field.
“It was six points gained for Lando, but I think it’s not so straightforward [to say] that this could have been more considering the competitiveness of the car.”
