Laurence Edmondson
Lando Norris said his qualifying lap at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix was strewn with mistakes after he could only manage fourth on the grid for Sunday’s race at Imola.
Norris was 0.292 seconds slower than McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri on pole position, and was outqualified by the Red Bull of Max Verstappen and the Mercedes of George Russell.
“I made a lot of mistakes,” he told reporters when asked about his lap. “Yeah, it’s just never good enough in my final lap in qualifying, you know? Everyone goes quicker, and I always go slower. Just not good enough.”
After four consecutive wins for Piastri in the last four races, Norris has slipped 16 points adrift of his teammate in the championship standings and, without a surprise result in Sunday’s 63-lap race, will face an even bigger gap heading to the next round in Monaco.
After struggling for performance in qualifying at the Bahrain Grand Prix and crashing during qualifying in Saudi Arabia earlier this season, Norris has been at a loss to explain his lack of performance when it matters in Q3.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m not going to just blame the car — that’s not me.
“I felt good all weekend. I feel good in Q1 and Q2, I felt like the lap time is available, but when I try and go for lap time, I just doesn’t go.
“In my whole career qualifying has been my biggest strength, by a long way. This year it is just not going my way.
“I think we understand some reasons why. But yeah, of course, I’m not going to be the happiest about it, because I want to be fighting for pole, and things are just not going the way that they should do.
“So, I’m working hard. The team are working hard, and, yeah, it’s difficult moments, but it’s the way it is at the minute.”
Asked if he could make progress up the order in Sunday’s race, Norris added: “It’s going to be tricky. I think just overtaking naturally is going to be quite impossible here, you know?
“There are maybe good chances on strategy, I have to just hope the tyres die very quickly and maybe we can do better as a team than others, and maybe that will open up my chances to do overcuts or undercuts on the guys ahead.
“But we’ve not done many long runs. We’ve not used the hard tyre yet, so there are many, many unanswered questions. But of course, I’ll do everything as always to try race my way back.”
