The McLaren driver says one magical Q2 lap hid the true gap to the front, and puts the loss at about two tenths in the first three corners.
McLaren's Lando Norris qualified sixth for the Mexico City Grand Prix and said the team is too slow to run at the front. He put the loss at about two tenths a lap through Turns 1 to 3, with Oscar Piastri out in Q2.
Lando Norris will start the Mexico City Grand Prix from sixth on the grid and says McLaren are simply too slow. The 2025 World Champion had topped Q2 with a lap he called magical, but could not repeat it in Q3.
Norris was second fastest on Friday and quickest in FP3 before that Q2 effort. McLaren team mate Oscar Piastri was eliminated in Q2 after qualifying 13th, which Norris pointed to as evidence of how hard it is to string a lap together in this car.
What Norris said
Norris said nothing slipped away in Q3 and that he is pretty happy with P6 given the car McLaren have. After his Q2 lap, he said, he knew Q3 would be tough, because repeating that lap was close to impossible. Every so often he can put a perfect lap together and everyone gets a little hope, he said, but Q3 then shows the reality.
He explained the margin in numbers. On the Q2 lap he had a strong headwind through Turn 12, worth about a tenth and a half because the car gripped. On the next lap he carried the same speed in, lost the rear and dropped a tenth, leaving him about two and a half tenths slower than before.
Where McLaren lose time
Asked where the team gives away time to its rivals, Norris said it was every corner. He pointed to the GPS data, saying the car is weakest in Sector 1 through Turns 1, 2 and 3, where he put the deficit at about two tenths every lap. If the team is that far off in the opening three corners, he said, it cannot expect to be close over the rest of the lap. Turn 7, he said, is the only corner where he feels strong.
Even so, he said the occasional quick lap is a positive, because it shows the speed can be there when everything comes together, even if nobody knows when that will happen.
