McLaren 'in a strong position to score good points'

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McLaren drivers Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris were feeling upbeat after qualifying for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix on Friday which will see Piastri lining up in fifth place alongside Norris in P6.

"I think that was probably the most we could have got out of it," Piastri said of his grid position for tomorrow's race.

"We definitely still have some things to improve with the car but I think that was a pretty solid session, minus a little tap of the wall in Q1," he acknowledged.

"But it was a decent session and the car felt pretty good. All-in-all, we can be pretty happy with that," he continued. "Going into tomorrow, I think we’re in a good position and hopefully we can move forward.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella was also in a positive frame of mind after qualifying, feeling that it had set them up nicely for a successful race.

Read also: Verstappen sweeps Jeddah qualifying for pole

“A good result for the team today in qualifying puts us in a strong position to score good points tomorrow," Stella said.

"Lando and Oscar made constant improvements today, session-by-session, and put together competitive laps in a field that was tight all the way through qualifying.

“With Lando, we decided to bias the tyre strategy slightly more towards the race, so it’s good that he’s up there in qualifying," he pointed out.

"With Oscar, we wanted to maximise qualifying potential and he did a very good job in achieving this result. We’re looking forward to a productive race.”

Despite finishing behind Piastri in Q3, Norris similarly described the result of the evening's session as being a good one for the team.

"I don’t think we could have asked for much more as a team, so I’m happy," he said after the chequered flag. "I think we got the most out of the car.

"We went 4-2-1 with the tyres, which put us at a disadvantage in qualifying with one fewer set of tyres. That made our life a little bit trickier today, but we knew that, we knew what to expect, and we hope it will pay us back tomorrow."

Norris was also thinking of his former McLaren team mate Carlos Sainz with whom he had a strong bond in his first years at Woking. Sainz was diagnosed with appendicitis on Friday morning and underwent surgery at a local hospital.

"Best wishes to Carlos, hopefully he'll have a speedy recovery," Norris said, adding that he had been impressed by Ferrari reserve driver Oliver Bearman who had stepped in with just three hours notice before FP3.

"Well done to Ollie, that's a really impressive result given he didn't know he'd be driving an F1 car today. He definitely seems to like this circuit!"

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.