McLaren’s Lando Norris had a fascinating race at the F1 Bahrain GP after penalties and overtakes to take P3.
Lando Norris looked favoured for pole position on Saturday, only to end up in P6 during a difficult qualifying session. Norris stepped up during the beginning of the race, going from P6 to P3 in the first lap of the Bahrain GP, overtaking Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli, Alpine’s Pierre Gasly and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
But not before enjoying a false start to begin the race, leaving the Brit a five-second penalty that was taken at the first round of pit stops.
Norris continued fighting hard and overtook Ferrari’s Hamilton, but was forced to give the place back to the seven-time World Champion for passing him out of track limits.
Norris fought Leclerc for P3 and chased down Mercedes’s George Russell, who was on softs for over 20 laps.
The “messy” race
When the Leader of the Driver’s Championship was asked about the whirlwind of a race at Parc Ferme.
From false starts to wheel-to-wheel overtakes, Norris said:
“I didn’t think I was that far forward, I guess. Nothing more than that. So, a tough race, of course.
“I made too many mistakes with the overtakes. The out-of-position [with Hamilton] was a messy race for me and disappointing not to bring home a one-two for McLaren because that would have been lovely at home. So, a tough one, but still a few positives.”
He added further to the battle with the Ferraris: “It was good racing throughout, so no complaints. Just good fun.”
Norris thought he would ‘get him’
During the last segments of the F1 Bahrain GP, Norris and Russell fought for P2. Russell was only just able to keep Norris at bay as he pushed closer and closer every lap.
When asked about this, Norris said: “I thought I’d be able to get him. I guess he was probably just saving a little bit for the end. But, yeah, he did it well. So, he did a good job.”
He also congratulated his teammate Oscar Piastri and added: “Oscar did a good job. So, congrats to Oscar and the whole McLaren team and I’ll try and step it up for next weekend [in Saudi Arabia].”
Lando Norris: “I just kept stopping myself” from making progress
Speaking in the post-race press conference later, Norris was downbeat about his efforts this weekend.
“I qualified sixth yesterday which is pretty terrible, so how can I possibly be happy? That just doesn’t make sense.
” Of course, I’m a little bit happier today that I managed to get back to P3. I had a good start, all those things.
“But I think P2 was the best we could have achieved today – so we should have achieved it. But we didn’t – and I didn’t, because of some mistakes. So, mixed feelings. I think the pace is good – the car is obviously mega, as Oscar showed, but yeah, just too many mistakes there.”
Asked to reflect on his start, Norris admitted he ‘not happy’ with the feeling of the MCL39.
“When I was in P3 I was pretty happy. I saw it was going to be tough to get past George. They’ve not been that bad this weekend. One and a half tenths off pole position – so they’re clearly not struggling.
” I didn’t expect to get past that easily, and I mean, I didn’t at all. I was happy – a good opening lap, aggressive and attacking, which I needed to be. But then I had the penalty and everything got a lot worse, you know?
“So I had the penalty, boxed earlier than everyone else, had to push more to try and make up five seconds – just about made it up. But then I’m on older tyres, much hotter tyres, and then kind of paid the price for that again.
“Just every time I did one thing good, I did two bad in a way. I just kept stopping myself from making as much progress as I should have done today. So I mean, I’m happy that the pace was there. Difficult to overtake – clearly the dirty air is just horrible. I’m happier with my pace today than I was yesterday, but still just not in the best feeling with the car at the moment.”
