The McLaren focus on upgrading the car cost the race at the Belgian Grand Prix, says driver Lando Norris. But McLaren team principal Andrea Stella disagreed. Norris claimed that the team was so focused on upgrading the car that it did not plan adequately for the race. Stella denied that.
McLaren suffered a rare off weekend at the Spa track where the Belgian Grand Prix was held. Norris and his teammate Oscar Piastri were almost unique in running with a high downforce wing. It paid off in the wet conditions on Friday and Saturday but proved a drag during the dry Sunday race.
In the dry track conditions on Sunday (August 6), Lando Norris found himself being steadily passed by a line of rivals. He eventually finished in seventh place. Piastri retired from the race after a collision with Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz.
Norris complained the team’s focus on upgrading the car affected planning for the race.
But Stella rejected this idea, blaming the result instead on the lack of a low downforce wing—a revelation that highlights the complex relationship in Formula 1 between aerodynamics and performance.
Stella said: “In perfect hindsight, we could have tried to find some other solution to reduce the drag on the car. I’m not sure how much efficiency would have shed, [how much] we would have removed off the car. It could be that we couldn’t have been able to achieve yesterday’s [Saturday] results if we had made this choice so obviously for a dry race, you do want to race with less drag.” an article from sportskeeda.com mentioned.
What issue had Lando Norris complained about?
Lando Norris made a startling statement in which he frankly discussed the necessity for his team to conduct a thorough re-evaluation of their strategic approach. The team’s performance over the weekend was considerably hampered by the major divergence in wing level used. It turned out to be significantly outside of the ideal point.
Norris said, “We just need to rethink how we approach the weekend. The wing level and stuff like this might work on [this circuit], but it doesn’t work on all of them. And we clearly got it wrong. All of the focus was on doing [the upgrades], which is the correct thing to do,” an article from sportskeeda.com mentioned.
The tough Spa track, where Lando Norris earned a P7, put an end to his impressive string of P2 finishes at Silverstone and Hungary. This unfortunate turn of events serves as a stark reminder of the unpredictability of motorsport, showing that even experienced drivers like Norris must contend with the constantly shifting winds of competition.
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