MCLAREN BACK IN THE MIX DURING COMPETITIVE SINGAPORE SPRINT QUALIFYING

MEDIA RELEASE/McLaren Mastercard F1 Team – Photo: supplied

After a couple of weekends where the MCL40 looked off the pace of the leading pack, the McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team had a good first day in Singapore, culminating in Oscar Piastri qualifying P4 and Lando Norris P5 for tomorrow’s Singapore Sprint.

Friday began with a singular practice session. Both cars went out on the green light, keen to maximise time on track. Following a lot of careful analysis after the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia, the team arrived in Singapore with a few new ideas to examine during practice. The team also split the cars with Lando running the H-wing and Oscar with a conventional set-up, before they came together on the H-wing for Sprint Qualifying.

The cars ran a Hard tyre for the bulk of Practice, with a Qualifying sim on the Soft at the very end of the session. Both drivers struggled a little with the bumpy nature of the circuit, but the car, while a little skittish, was also competitive, with Lando ending the session P3 and Oscar P5.

Once night fell, and the lights took hold, Sprint Qualifying confirmed the MCL40 is back in contention with the leading pack. While the Red Bulls, as expected, looked very strong, the gaps between the top four teams were small. SQ1, however, was more fraught than expected, with first yellows and then a Red Flag interrupting the session with 6m9s remaining and neither driver having a time on the board. At the resumption, Lando put himself safe immediately, but Oscar had to convert his first attempt to a warm-up lap and got himself ahead of the cut-off only after the Chequered Flag. He went through P7, Lando P6.

There was a hold before the start of SQ2 as the FIA dealt with some gremlins in the timing system, but once the session got underway, it ran much more smoothly, with both drivers able to progress with their first lap and abort their second attempt, before the switch to Softs in SQ3. 

Timing was tight to get in two laps here, with the McLaren Mastercard cars and the Mercedes pair going at the very start of the session to ensure there was time for a double-cool between push laps. Even so, the timing was tight, with Oscar getting over the line to start his second push just a few seconds ahead of the Chequered Flag. After the first runs, Lando was P2 and Oscar P4. Lando failed to improve on his second push and dropped to P5, but Oscar found an extra three-tenths and moved up to P4, ahead of his teammate. 

The day went very fast as is always the case on a Sprint weekend, but as we approach the end of this epic triple-header, the sense in the team was that we’ve learned a lot about the Baku upgrade in the last two weeks and have confidence we can put that to good use tomorrow and on Sunday.

Four of the McLaren Driver Development Programme members are also racing this weekend. In the 4 Hours of Portimão ELMS round, ahead of Qualifying later today, Grégoire Saucy’s Number 22 entry finished FP2 in P2 overall and LMP2 rankings, with Richard Verschoor’s Number 30 in P15 overall and P5 in the LMP2 Pro/Am rankings. In the E4 Championship in Monza, Christian Costoya finished P9 in FP1 and P23 in FP2 before Qualifying takes place in the European afternoon. In the final round of British F4, Championship leader Dries Van Langendonck will Qualify tomorrow ahead of Race 1 later in the day.

Oscar Piastri “P4. Overall, happy with that. I think we got close to the maximum of what we could have achieved today. It’s always difficult on a Sprint weekend to get everything right, but I was much happier than in the past few weeks with our performance. We were struggling quite a bit on the Mediums, but the car really came alive once we switched to the Softs. The added grip gave me the confidence to push, and it felt like a different car. That said, while the Soft was a big step in the right direction, it helped mask some issues so there’s still work to do to find a more comfortable balance for the rest of the weekend. We’ll see what we can do in the Sprint tomorrow ahead of Grand Prix Qualifying.”

Lando Norris P5 today, but not my best lap. Overall, the car is feeling good, and as a team, we are happy that things are working exactly as they should. However, the field is incredibly close, and you have to put in a perfect lap, which I unfortunately didn’t manage to do. We’ll review the data this evening, see what we can do from P5 on the grid tomorrow and then look to improve in tomorrow’s Grand Prix Qualifying session.”

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