After a difficult Qualifying at the F1 Italian GP, Lando Norris put his McLaren on the front row for Sunday’s race with a P2 result. While this result is not ideal for the Brit, especially after leading in two Free Practice sessions. Yet, in terms of the title fight, he managed to outqualify his teammate and rival.
With a total of 275 points in the Drivers’ Championship, Norris stays close behind Oscar Piastri. Since his unfortunate DNF during last weekend’s round at the Dutch GP, the Briton will need all the points he can bring home. The MCL39 looks strong, and the Temple of Speed offers plenty of overtaking opportunities.
Qualifying overview in Parc Fermé
Despite Lando Norris’ final attempts at outdoing Verstappen’s pole lap, the Briton lacked the pace in the end. His F1 Italian GP Qualifying session was alright, yet Norris pointed out his mistakes cost him that P1. Nevertheless, the McLaren driver was not shocked by Verstappen’s speed at Monza.
“No, no. Max has been quick all weekend, and it’s never a surprise with Max. So, no. I mean, it was quite a session for me – just up and down and too many mistakes here and there. But to put it all together on the last lap, I was pretty happy. So I’m happy with P2.”
Norris did manage to finish ahead of Piastri, his biggest title rival this season. While he would have wanted to claim that pole position, the Brit remains mainly satisfied with today’s driving.
“I mean, I always kind of give my result depending on how I drove today. So I feel like I didn’t do the best of jobs, but to end up P2, I was happy with. So, let’s say, good things and bad things. P2 is still not a bad position to be off the line. And, I mean, I want to be ahead of everyone. That includes my championship contenders and Oscar. So, yeah. Good position for tomorrow and excited for the race.”
Sunday predictions
Without a doubt, Lando Norris looks forward to the F1 Italian GP race showdown. Since McLaren is known for their race pace this season, the 25-year-old will push to overtake Verstappen. The Briton is aware of Red Bull Racing’s strength, with lap times that can match theirs.
“I mean, Sunday is normally our strength. But, yeah, to get past Max, I’m sure it’s going to be a big challenge. But we’ll wait and see. Their pace was also very strong. If you see the end of the stint, they’re doing the same lap times as us. So I don’t expect any magical things.”
Unfortunately for McLaren, both Ferraris were strong all weekend. With Monza being their playground and home race, Lando Norris remains cautious.
“And we have some Ferraris behind who I’m sure are going to want to come through as quickly as possible. It’s a long race. Many things can happen, and we’ll see what we can do.”
The unfortunate events of Q3
During the last 10 minutes of Qualifying, Norris held provisional pole for the F1 Italian GP. When asked if he believed he could have held onto that P1, the Briton was disheartened. According to the McLaren driver, even if that Q3 lap was his personal best, it was not good enough.
“I’ll say no just because it was a pretty bad qualifying from my behalf. I think it was the best lap I did in quali by like six tenths or something. So impressive that I managed to improve so much, or probably impressive that I did such a bad job prior to that.
“But I think Max has been pretty good all weekend. I think also us as a team since FP1 already, we found that we were not quite in as good of a rhythm and had the pace advantage that we’ve had the past few weekends. So, of course, we wanted P1. But I don’t think we’d be disappointed to take a P2 either,” stated Norris, closing off his statement on a high note.
Finding his pace too late
In terms of what went wrong during Qualifying, the 25-year-old was just disappointed with every mistake. Attributing his bad performance to a one-off, Norris seemed to have lost some momentum when it mattered.
“Just I was hitting every kerb possible that I don’t want to hit and just locking up when I shouldn’t lock up. So just not quite in the rhythm. It’s not that I’ve not been in the rhythm this weekend.
“I’ve felt like I’ve done some reasonable laps so far this weekend. And I felt like I had some good strengths here and there. But just couldn’t click back into it come quali, until the final lap. But that’s also the only lap that I need to do it, so I’m happy that I did it in the end.”
Expecting a good Sunday
As Norris will be sharing the first line with Verstappen tomorrow, his hopes to overtake him are high. The MCL39 proved time and time again that it holds more pace in the longer race format than in qualifying. However, Lando Norris remains unsure if he can regain the pole he lost in Qualifying, considering Red Bull’s improvements at the F1 Italian GP.
“I definitely want to expect that. Everyone knows that our race pace is probably a bigger strength than our quali pace. We’ve proven that many times. But, like Max said, they’ve improved a lot from last year. I think coming into the weekend, we probably didn’t expect the Red Bull to be quite as good.
“But as soon as we did the first few runs, it was clear that they made some good steps compared to last season. So we’ll see. His race pace was good on Friday. It wasn’t too dissimilar to ours. So time will tell.”
How tow impacts a flying lap
When you drive the best car on the grid, other teams sometimes make their decisions after yours. This is what happened to the McLaren driver during his first outing in Q3, when he struggled without tow from a car ahead. Lando Norris was expecting this sort of outcome coming into the F1 Italian GP Qualifying.
“The opinion? Terrible, but I had no choice. Everyone’s waiting for us to go out first, really. I knew already last week that I was going to have a bad Q1 because I knew I was going to have to go out the pit lane first. And that was always going to be the expectation.”
The Temple of Speed relies on tow, since it is mostly a high-speed and heavy-braking circuit. Therefore, the Briton faced difficulties as he was trying to set a good flying lap without it. Norris was gutted with this situation, explaining his frustration throughout all three sessions of Qualifying.
“It’s tough because you know it’s never going to be a pole lap. Especially without straight line speed, which is quite a long way down on pretty much everyone. It’s impossible to even set a competitive lap. So it’s not the most reassuring thing doing Q1 and doing a 19.5. Pretty much, being about five and a half tenths off pole at that point. Not the best feeling inside the car.
“Especially, in Q3, run two, I knew I had a slipstream. But it’s hard to know how much just the slipstream is going to help me a little bit. I don’t know what it’s like over a whole lap – maybe three tenths or something. It’s a mixture of having someone pushing some air in front of you. It was still a good lap, easily my best lap that I did. Like I said, I knew last weekend that I was going to be first out on Q3, run one. So it went exactly how I thought it would go.”
Lacking momentum after Q2
Before regaining his footing in Q3, Norris’ F1 Italian GP Qualifying showcased the peak of his struggles. The Briton pointed out the lack of rhythm he faced, saying that his lock-ups ruined whole laps. When his confidence was down, his flying laps suffered.
“It definitely wasn’t the most comfortable I’ve ever been, just because I wasn’t in that rhythm. To try and put in those laps, especially when you lock up in Turn 1. That’s the one place it’s hard. It kind of knocks the confidence the most.”
This was clearly a sore subject for the McLaren driver, as he went on to analyse the mistakes that cost him. Surprisingly, Lando Norris almost lost all faith in making it to Q3. Nonetheless, the recovery was sweet as he managed to regain a bit of trust.
“My Q2 run… my run two, first lap one was pretty bad. It was just so close. I think I improved almost a tenth, but it gained me six positions or something. Shows how such a small amount of lap time can help. I was definitely feeling it in both Q3, run two, and Q2, run two, lap two. Not the best feeling inside the car at that point. That’s why I’m relatively happy I got into Q3 because I was out for a little while. And then to put it all together for Q3, run two as well.”
The threat of Verstappen
The Red Bull of Max Verstappen took everyone by surprise when he snatched Norris’ pole position. Especially since the F1 Italian GP proved to be quite challenging last year for the Dutchman. Yet, the 25-year-old McLaren driver was not so surprised. As the gaps keep closing in on McLaren, Lando Norris faces a difficult battle.
The Briton pointed out that Verstappen has been a threat all season long, not just this weekend:
“When you look at previous races, even when we’ve been incredible in weekends, there have been plenty where Max has beaten us in a fair few races this season. He qualified ahead in many races this season. Even last weekend’s Q3 onboard, it wasn’t like the gaps were huge. Everyone was pretty close. We come to a track, we lose a tenth, he gains a tenth, and that’s all the difference. I wouldn’t say it’s a surprise.”
However, their biggest rivals had trouble at Monza last year. Finishing his interview for the Italian GP post-qualifying press conference, Norris credited Red Bull’s recovery. His honest overview of their improvements showed sportsmanship and growth:
“The real surprise is compared to last year. But at the same time, when you have a strong team that have won for many years, the drivers and just a strong team in general, you expect them to improve like they’ve done from last year. And also from their difficulties at the beginning of the season to where they are now. So, not a surprise, but to improve so much from where they were here last year is credit to them.”
