Lando Norris claimed Max Verstappen and Red Bull have been able to get away with mistakes in their dominant reign. Speaking to onsite media ahead of the Spanish GP, the Briton felt that the Dutchman and his team won in Canada as a result of making the fewest mistakes.
Although Lando Norris was in a good position to win the race, safety cars and effective pitstop strategies played into the hands of Red Bull and Max Verstappen in Canada. Christian Horner had mentioned the crucial importance of timing their pitstops and tire changes well. It was starting to look like Mercedes and McLaren’s weekend as Red Bull struggled with drivability issues in the dry conditions, particularly when it came to riding the kerbs.
Trending
Reflecting upon the Canadian GP weekend, Lando Norris claimed that the Dutchman had gotten away with errors in the past. However, he added that the Dutch champion won the Canadian GP as he was the most consistent driver and had made the least mistakes. The 24-year-old also claimed that the triple champion has proved several times that he can win despite the odds.
Asked if it took a well-organized team more than just a good car to win races, Lando Norris said:
“Yes, 100%. Especially now, probably for Max over the last four years, three years, he's probably been able to get away with a lot of mistakes and still easily win and the team maybe made mistakes and he could still easily win. Like let's say he shouldn't have won last weekend in Montreal, but he was probably just the most consistent in the race. Probably made it as a team, the least mistakes, as a driver the least mistakes and came out on top.”
“If you think of the safety car, from our side, we should have boxed. We lost the lead on that and I lost an opportunity to fight for the win. George had the quickest car, was driving extremely well all weekend. From an outright pace point of view, and if you didn't make a couple of the mistakes he did do, which all drivers do, including Max, probably also should have had a chance of winning the race,” he added.
Praising Verstappen’s performance in Canada, Lando Norris added:
“So from that perspective, you kind of think Max should not have won and he still won the race. Which just shows that even when he hasn't had the best car and things like that, he still kind of shows what he's capable of doing. But we've always known it. Like it's not simply we just got a better car and then you just crack on and forget about everything else. Now it's actually even more important to get the strategy right, to get the smaller things correct. Because at the end of the day when the cars are so similar on pace, those things start to make a big difference.”
Lando Norris believes Canadian GP loss will boost McLaren to do better in Spain
Lando Norris believes the Canadian GP loss will serve as an encouragement to improve for Spain. He felt that there were positives and negatives from the fact that they have had a better run in 2024 following a spell of dull seasons.
Although they’ve been close to a win in the last few races, Norris feels better strategy calls in the future would yield better results. Asked if being close to wins in the last few races has been encouraging, Lando Norris said:
“Both I think you have to look at the positives because I think we are still fresh off consecutive bad seasons. So I think we definitely have to remind ourselves of how bad it's been and the progress we've made. I think it's easy to forget that very quickly. I think that's good motivation for everyone, is the knowledge of last year how bad we were versus where we are now, like I think that's encouraging for everyone in the team. So reminding everyone of that I think is important."
Lando Norris elaborated on the performance of McLaren so far and said:
“But at the same time, everything is relative. You have to still, whether you're fighting for first or tenth, when you have [the] knowledge that you could have made better decisions, you could have potentially won a race, and the win means even more. You know, because like when you're fighting for tenth and it might be for ninth, then you're like, okay, it's one or two points. But when it's like second and you're like I should have won a race, you're winning a freaking race. So here it's pretty [much] more, but at the same time encouraged because having the knowledge that we should have won just kind of makes us more motivated to go into the next race weekend thinking ‘try [to] make up for the last one’.”
Lando Norris clinched a win in Miami and a podium in Canada. However, the Miami victory was a result of a similar circumstance where Red Bull got their strategy call incorrect and a safety car benefited him. Nevertheless, the recently crowned Grand Prix winner is now third in the Drivers' Championship and could be a serious contender for the title with 15 races left on the calendar.
