Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo completed the best weekend of the season at the Australian GP. Between them, McLaren added a total of 18 points, being the team’s best performance since the 2021 Russian GP, almost seven months ago.
With both drivers inside the points zone, McLaren also managed to rise from eighth to fourth in the Formula 1 constructors’ championship in 2022.
However, this result could remain an anecdote. According to Norris , the characteristics of the Albert Park circuit have put the MCL36 in a position that they will not be able to hold for the next few race weekends.
“The car behaved very well from FP1 and continued to do so throughout the weekend, which is good news. It shows that the car has some strengths,” he told Motorsport.com.
“To be honest, we just have to keep working on the weak points if we want to be [up front] more often, because not every circuit is as smooth and fast as [Melbourne].”
“So I think this is going to be the best result we get for a long time, now we’re going to go to circuits that may be more difficult for us. But the team is motivated. I guess a day like today really helps the team and raises everyone’s morale,” he added.
After finishing fifth behind the Mercedes, Norris admitted he tried to keep up with the Silver Arrows after they both overtook him on the first lap of the race, until he realized that George Russell and Lewis Hamilton were still too fast for him.
“Obviously we would have liked to fight a bit more with the Mercedes,” he added. “If I had been in front after the first corner, they would surely have passed me at some point anyway, so I don’t think there is anything to be unhappy about.”
“We saw in Bahrain what a difference they made to us and the car we have [this weekend] is basically the same as the one we had there. We haven’t changed a lot of things, and that shows we still have a lot of work to do.”
“Fifth and sixth is always a good result, but obviously I think it would have been worse if the two Ferraris and the two Red Bulls had been able to finish the race. We just took advantage of the bad luck of the others,” concluded the British McLaren driver .
