McLaren may be heading Scuderia Ferrari by five points in the constructors’ standings, but after Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz took a shock one-two in Free Practice 2 for the Monaco Grand Prix, Lando Norris said he was unsurprised by the pace of the SF21 cars – while tipping former team mate Carlos Sainz as a potential winner on the streets of Monte Carlos.
Lando Norris’ own performance was far from shabby in Thursday’s running at Monaco, the newly re-signed McLaren driver following up a P7 in Free Practice 1 with P6 in Free Practice 2 – as team mate Daniel Ricciardo struggled to 15th in both sessions.
But after ending the second practice session 0.695s off the leading pace of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, Norris said that the performance of McLaren’s nearest rivals hadn’t been a shock.
“I don’t think the Ferraris are surprising from what we know,” said Norris – “Maybe from a spectator point of view, they don’t get to see everything that we see, all the onboards and the data and stuff. We knew they were going to be very fast.”
Meanwhile, Norris revealed that he’d been in contact with former McLaren team mate Carlos Sainz in the build-up to Monaco, suggesting that the Spaniard – who’s never finished outside the points in Monte Carlo – could pull off a shock result this weekend…
“I texted Carlos before the weekend to say you’re going to be very good this weekend, you’re going to have a chance to win,” chuckled Norris. “It’s expected from us, they are looking strong, which isn’t good for us, but we’re doing the best job we can, and I think where we were today is where we deserve to be.” – he concluded.
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