Latest McLaren hires give Norris “even more” faith

Sportem
Sportem
9 Min Read

In the round-up: Lando Norris he is confident that McLaren CEO Zak Brown is leading the team in the right direction.

In brief

Norris confident McLaren are taking steps forward under Brown

McLaren announced this week they have signed Red Bull’s chief engineering officer Rob Marshall as their technical director. He will join another new signing, Ferrari’s David Sanchez, at the team next year.

Norris said it is a positive sign for his team’s future. Asked how much faith he had in Brown’s vision for McLaren, he answered: “I would say a lot. Even more now than in the past.”

“I guess I would never want to say that I have no belief and I never have said it and probably won’t,” he continued. “But definitely since the last few changes, there have been a lot of good things coming from that, both in terms of mood, atmosphere, but at the same time, also performance and things to look forward to in the future.

“Not everything is purely direct in Formula 1. A lot of things take time. So I guess you have that part of it too, but definitely things have taken a step forward so I can easily confirm that and say it with confidence. But, until we see it, that’s the timely part.”

No rethink over Aston Martin’s Monaco pit call for Alonso

Fernando Alonso insists Aston Martin made the right decision to risk pitting for slick tyres first as rain fell during last weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix. The move surprised many, as six drivers before him had taken intermediates, and he returned to the pits the next lap for the same.

“I think it was the right decision,” Alonso told media including RaceFans. “Maybe if you have a crystal ball and you know the conditions, you know who stops, who doesn’t stop and then finally it rains and you need the inters – 100% you stop for inters.

“What I don’t like in Formula 1 is that we see always the negatives and we all see everything very easily from the sofa. I tell you an example: If we stopped for inters, this week we will only talk about the wrong decision of Red Bull for stopping one lap too late for Max. We would never say that Aston Martin was very brave and chose the right tyre – we would only talk that Red Bull chose the wrong tyre and they stopped Max one lap later. This is the other mentality of Formula 1, the unlimited search for perfection, which is not possible to reach some sometimes.”

Le Mans hypercar BoP changed after all

Flying WEC Toyotas will be reined in for Le Mans

The FIA and Le Mans 24 Hours organisers the ACO are changing the Balance of Performance (BoP) for the hypercar class for next weekend’s blue riband endurance race.

Toyota have won all three World Endurance Championship rounds so far this season. A joint statement by the FIA and ACO said that the strict parameters governing each of the hypercar models would be modified as the performance difference between them was “greater than initially anticipated.”

“Considering these factors, and following an in-depth analysis of available data,” the statement continued,” the WEC Committee has decided that the goal of ensuring a level playing field within the Hypercar class will be best achieved by implementing correction between, but also within, the LMH and the LMDh platforms.”

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