Q&A LANDO NORRIS

Lando Norris made his grand prix weekend debut for Mclaren, taking over Fernando Alonso’s car for

FP1. Norris set a best time of 1m47.364s from his 26 laps, 0.088s faster than Stoffel Vandoorne, who had problems in the other Mclaren. Norris will drive again at Monza tomorrow (Friday).

Did you get any hints on how Mclaren rated you?

I was out at the same time as Stoffel but we were testing quite a few things: high downforce, low downforce, different tyres, different bits on the car. It’s always very difficult to compare. In terms of myself, how quickly I got up to speed, in terms of what they said, consistency and my feedback, everything was really good. I was happy with the job I did. It’s hard to have any comparison with Stoffel or Fernando, so I was happy.

Is this a key time to prove yourself given Mclaren has a seat available next year? Yeah, definitely. Obviously, I’m doing everything I can on track, I’m going as fast as I can and [trying to show] I’m worthy of a seat. It’s not all about pure speed, it’s about being consistent, giving good feedback. It’s important in the development of the car. I know I’m normally critical of myself, but I think it went smoothly and I didn’t make any mistakes, I think if I really had to I could find more time. I chose the safer option of being more consistent, not going off. I put some good laps on the board, decent laps, so I’m happy with what I did.

How important are your free practice outings for next year’s seat?

I don’t know if it’s the definite decider, but I know it’s a very good opportunity for me to show what I can do. With such a short amount of time being on track, we did three proper runs – four push laps, three push laps, three push laps. So, you can’t have loads of laps to build up to it, you have to be on it straight away. It’s a track I haven’t driven in an F1 car, in a car I haven’t driven a lot, against drivers who have done it for a couple of seasons.