Lando Norris says his fourth-place finish at the Qatar Grand Prix weekend was just a flop after a strong run of top-three finishes ended and led to a title decider.
McLaren made the wrong choice under an early safety car by leaving both drivers on track while the rest of the field pitted to save time, and championship rival Max Verstappen went on to win the race. That brought Norris’ lead back to twelve points, but with his title chances still in his own hands, Norris is philosophical about his performance.
“The car was good, Oscar (Piastri, teammate) finished second and was very fast,” said Norris. “Nothing to complain about, just strategy, because the second car is always a bit worse and had me over the line. It wasn’t even the fact that we were the second car, we shouldn’t have done what we did. It’s that simple.”
“I can’t help it. Obviously not our best day, not our best weekend. But I don’t know if anyone saw that the set of results I got before was great. So I put myself in this position. I’m still happy.”
“It wasn’t our best day, it wasn’t my best weekend in terms of riding and putting things together. But that’s life. Everyone has bad weekends. I take it on the chin, we take it on the chin, and we’ll see what we can do next weekend.”
Norris acknowledged that McLaren’s mistake during the safety car phase took into account his own potential loss of race time, and says he could not simply override the decision and the pit.
“Probably [should have followed Verstappen into the pits]’but we both should have,’ he said. “I would have crossed the line anyway because we would have been double-stacked, and I might have lost time. Maybe with a little time, I wouldn’t have lost a position, I don’t think.
“But something we will talk about and evaluate. I also have to trust that the team will make the right choice, and that is what I had to do.”
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