Jeddah 'smooth' track allowing McLaren to extract more from MCL36

Lando Norris says Jeddah's quicker and smoother layout is allowing McLaren to extract "more potential" from its troubled MCL36.

Norris concluded his opening day of running in Saudi Arabia among the top-ten, the Briton clocking in P7 at the end of Friday's second practice session, 0.661s adrift of Ferrari pacesetter Charles Leclerc.

Although McLaren has yet to solve the downforce deficit impacting the performance of its new car, Norris reckoned the track's characteristics somewhat mitigated the issue compared to Bahrain.

"A reasonable day," said Norris. "A few things feeling a little bit better because of the type of track – much quicker and a lot smoother, so there are definitely some differences.

"I think that’s allowing us to extract a little bit more potential out of the car.

"We’re feeling a little bit more confident, but it’s all very close and we’re still lacking in many areas, so we’ll continue to work on some of the progress we’ve made and see if we can get even more performance out of the car tomorrow."

• Read also: Villeneuve baffled by McLaren MCL36 'screw-up'

Norris outpaced teammate Daniel Ricciardo on Friday by 0.792, but the Aussie nevertheless labeled his day as productive.

"I think we hit the ground running and we haven’t needed to adjust the car too much, we’re just learning a bit more about it," he said.

"For our relative competitiveness, I think it was a productive day.

"It’s a good circuit to drive on, you get a good feeling around here, which is enjoyable.

"We've got some small changes to work on overnight, but all in all it’s been a good day and I think we’re in a little better shape than Bahrain."

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