Lando Norris admitted that he still wasn't feeling at home in the McLaren at Spa-Francorchamps this weekend, despite coming out of Friday's practice sessions with the fastest time.
Norris poste a time of 1:42.260 at the end of second practice which was 0.215s ahead of the best effort from his team mate Oscar Piastri who shaved Max Verstappen to P2 by two thousandths of a second.
But despite setting the pace, Norris admitted that there was still more time to come from the MCL38 once he felt more at home in the car tomorrow.
“I have not felt comfortable today with the car," he told the media in the paddock at Spa after the end of FP2. "Hopefully I wake up tomorrow and feel more comfortable. We’ll try to improve a few things.
“I know it looks good on the timesheets," he acknowledged. "But I didn’t feel super-comfortable going out and doing it. Hopefully I get in more of a rhythm out there."
Despite his concerns, Norris had little doubt that he and the team would find the missing time when it was needed over the remainder of the weekend.
“I don’t think it’s a lot," he insisted. "We always come to a circuit now and be within millimetres of the margin straight away.
“It’s not like you ever really change the whole car overnight anymore," he said. "If you do, you’re not doing a good enough job before the weekend.
“We prepared well. We have a good set up. It’s working. Just from my side [when it comes to] feeling like I can go out and nail it, I’m not quite there yet.”
Last week in Hungary, Norris was leading the race when her was told to hand over the position to Piastri who went on to claim his maiden win in what proved to be controversial circumstances.
This week, Norris has been playing down what happened and looking forward to having another chance of a McLaren pole and victory, especially with chief rival Verstappen hampered by a ten place grid penalty for taking a new engine.
"It's still tough and close," Norris said. "Red Bull are quick at the moment. It’s tricky."
"McLaren will be slightly reassured that Max is controllable in terms of pace,” suggested Sky Sports F1 analyst Naomi Schiff. in the live coverage of today's session.
"Max looked really, really quick [in FP2] especially in sector two, although that's not really where you do your overtaking," he added.
"[McLaren] will have to maximise that opening part of the first stint in the race. If the drivers work together, don't slow each other down, they can just open as much as a gap as they can so that Max can’t get back to them."
Last week, Piastri got the upper hand at the start diving down the inside of the first corner and leaving Norris scrapping with Verstappen, a battle that decided the eventual race result.
Rain may also play a big part in how things go in qualifying on Saturday and in the race on Sunday. “Generally for the rain you want to edge towards the high downforce," Norris explained. "I don’t think that’s maybe a direction to go in anyway.
“But I don’t know just yet, so I’ll sit down with my guys and we’ll talk about it," he added.
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