Ahead of the 2026 F1 Chinese GP, Lando Norris expects McLaren to be closer to Mercedes than at the Australian GP. Despite this, the World Champion believes McLaren will always be on the back foot of the works team in terms of the power unit.
McLaren did not have the opening weekend they had hoped for at the Australian GP. Oscar Piastri crashed before the race began on his way to the grid and was unable to start his home race. Lando Norris had a more positive weekend than Piastri, as he did partake in the race. Still, the McLaren driver started sixth and only gained one position.
Norris expects to be closer to Mercedes at the 2026 F1 Chinese GP
While the McLaren team is a Mercedes customer team and has the same engine, they have not been performing at the same level. Mercedes showed utter dominance from the third Free Practice session onwards. Although McLaren was expected to be nearer to Mercedes, the Brit still finished 51 seconds behind GP winner George Russell.
In a print media session, Lando Norris spoke about his expectations ahead of the 2026 Chinese GP.
“I hope and also expect it to be a bit closer [this weekend]. I think Melbourne was also one of the trickiest tracks of the season, we expect, from a power unit point of view, in terms of lift and coasting, and a lot of factors at play, from that side of things.
“There’s less of that here, so it should be a little bit simpler. And therefore, we expect to be a bit closer. Even if we were to go back to Melbourne, I think we would expect to be closer anyway, from what we’ve understood and been able to learn and figure out.
“But, at the same time, we also know we have to improve in all areas. It is not just power unit, just the car itself. It’s decent. We’re in a good starting position but we still want it to be better than what is it currently.”
Work to do on the car
“So there’s two sides. The car is a little bit maybe more long-term stuff from that side of it, but from a power unit point of view, we expect to be closer and more up to the performance of Mercedes, which is just a very, very, high level. They’re doing better than everyone, including us. There’s a lot that is down to us doing a better job at the same time, so we expect to do that this weekend.”
Lando Norris on Mercedes F1 power unit: “We’re always going to be on the back foot”
McLaren Team Principal Andrea Stella has been vocal about wanting more information regarding the power unit. When asked if there would be an effort to work more closely with HPP to extract more performance, Norris responded:
“I mean, we always do that. We’ve worked very closely ever since and they’ve helped us achieve the last couple of world championships together. It’s certainly not like that’s not the case already. It’s just early on in the season, there’s a lot of things to try to figure out and understand and it’s just that it’s not told. Certain things don’t need to be told because you always try and create your own advantages.
“But at the same time, there are certain things that we are having to figure out for ourselves. The rest of it is more for like, I don’t know what the rules are and what has to be said and what not, and those kind of things. That’s down to Andrea and the rest of the team, but we’ve always worked closely. We’ll continue to do it.
“As much as he said some of these things, there were still a lot of things that we just didn’t explore and maximise ourselves. So that’s kind of irrelevant.
“At the same time if we just do a better job ourselves and maximise data and figure it out more earlier, we would just do better anyway.
“The fact that we didn’t have the newer power unit at an earlier point means that we’re always going to be on the back foot, comparing to a team that’s performing extremely well, that’s a lot more prepared than we are able to be. I guess we just want to be able to be more prepared and that’s the main thing we’ve asked for.”
Norris: McLaren “playing catch-up” with Mercedes ahead of 2026 F1 Chinese GP
Stella said that McLaren needs to get more information from HPP and Mercedes. Since the Australian GP, there has been ongoing discussion about what needs to be shared and what each team is responsible for figuring out on their own.
Asked if there is a feeling within the team that they are not receiving everything they should from Mercedes by regulation, Norris was quick to disagree.
“I think we get everything we want. I certainly don’t think there’s any of that, I think we’re happy. We’re just delayed on all these processes. Therefore, I don’t think we are as prepared as what we want to be. It’s as simple as that and we’re playing catch up at round one rather than saying we’ve nailed everything. There’s a big gap and we’re figuring out things along the way, which is too late in the world of Formula 1.
“It’s none of that stuff. It’s just when you’re in the world of preparation, when you don’t feel prepared, and you’re finding out things along the way. That’s just not the position you want to be in.”
With McLaren and Norris figuring it out as they go, the 2026 F1 Chinese GP will show whether they have already closed the gap on Mercedes.
