Lando Norris has confessed that he found himself in a challenging space at the start of the 2023 F1 season, grappling with the early setbacks and underperformance of McLaren’s MCL60.
The Woking-based outfit suffered a dismal start to its campaign, finding itself pointless and at the bottom of the standings after the opening two races of the season.
In the first part of 2023, McLaren scored points in just three of the first eight events, collecting a double-points finish in Melbourne following a frantic finish to the Australian Grand Prix.
But once the team brought in new updates from Austria onwards their performance improved by leaps and bounds, and by the end of the season they had moved into fourth place in the Constructors standings ahead of Aston Martin.
Between them, Norris and Piastri claimed nine top-three finishes over the remainder of the year, with the Australian rookie securing a maiden F1 victory in the Qatar Sprint race.
Overall, and despite his team’s low-key start, Norris reckons that 2023 was his best season to date in F1.
“I think any time we’ve been close at getting a victory or I think the last six or seven races I had six P2s and all of them behind Max [Verstappen], no other drivers,” he said.
“So anytime out of those times something might have gone wrong we were in a perfect position.
“I think Brazil was one of my best races. I mean I look at it, it’s not a lot going on but in terms of gap to everyone else [26s ahead of third] with just one car ahead, I think it was a pretty good race. Mexico [17th to fifth] very good race.
“I think I’ve definitely been at my best in terms [of] performance, maybe not the beginning of the year.
“I worked quite a bit on trying to still adapt to this car because it’s not an easy car. And there’s still things every weekend that I struggle with, but I spent the first part of the season maybe not in the right space.”
While McLaren executed a remarkable turnaround, the core characteristics of its MCL60 design remained unchanged, forcing Norris to continue to adapt to his car’s specific traits.
“Still, how I want to drive quickly is the opposite of how this car wants to be driven,” the Briton continued.
“And still my natural thing of going out and driving qualifying as best as I would want is not how our car needs to be driven. So I still have to change a little bit how I have to drive the car.
“And that’s still been happening this year but since I would say the half-way point of the season I felt more confident.
“I feel like I’ve been getting the most out of the car especially from a racing perspective.”
Can McLaren eventually field a car suited to the Briton’s style? Norris believes it can.
“I’ve just made a few too many mistakes in qualifying which I think is a bit obvious and I’ve acknowledged,” the 24-year-old noted.
“But I definitely think that I’ve had some of the best races I’ve ever done, so that helps when you have a good car on top to go with you.
“As I’ve said many times before, I believe that McLaren can turn things around.
“This was the year that we needed and the team needed to prove those things which has been perfect.”
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