Lando Norris finds himself starting from P3 in the Mexican Grand Prix, admitting that McLaren doesn’t have the pace to match Ferrari this weekend. The 24-year-old Brit missed out on pole by three-tenths to Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, a gap that underscores the recent uptick in Ferrari’s performance and McLaren’s slight struggle to keep up. Norris, who has been in formidable form this season with 297 points and four pole positions in the last five races, expressed concern over Ferrari’s speed but remains determined to fight for a podium finish.
“The last few weekends, they’ve [Ferrari] been extremely quick and quicker than us,” Norris explained. “I don’t have the confidence to say, yes, we can just beat them on pace. Like today, not on their level. And they’ve been fastest for the last few weekends. So we’ll try our best. But I don’t think we have the pace compared to them at the moment.”
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella was candid about Norris’s Q3 performance, noting that the Brit struggled to manage his tire temperatures due to early mistakes on his first flying lap, impacting his overall pace. “On the first one, there were a couple of mistakes, and this overheated the tires,” Stella commented. “In the second one again, he wasn’t very clean but it was important to make sure he was decent enough to be there on the first or second row.”
As the lights go out at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, Norris will be focused on holding his ground against Sainz and Verstappen, positioned right ahead of him on the grid. With McLaren holding a slim 48-point lead over Ferrari in the Constructors’ Championship, every race counts as the season nears its end, and Norris knows that even a podium finish will be crucial. Despite McLaren’s momentary struggles, Norris is set to bring his A-game and take advantage of any opening against the dominant Ferraris.
