F1 News: Lando Norris Takes Fastest Lap In Testing With New McLaren
Lando Norris managed to take the top spot from Ferrari on the opening day of the pre-season testing in Barcelona.
The testing has started at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya which is a challenging track with 16 turns. Each driver will take the next few days to test out the new cars and get used to the biggest regulation change in F1 history.
What started to look as though Ferrari would take the fastest lap with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz at the wheels of the new F1-75s, quickly changed as Norris was finding his fastest laps towards the end of the day in the McLaren MCL36. Norris was able to set a pace of 1:19.951 which was more than half a second faster than Leclerc.
101 laps complete. Day one DONE! ✅ #F1Testing pic.twitter.com/P8IWLSLk6r
— McLaren (@McLarenF1) February 23, 2022
Ferrari was in the F1-75 car it branded as “innovative and daring” and was able to stay fast and consistent throughout the day and even covered the most miles out of all of the teams. But this didn’t stop McLaren, as Norris quickly got to grips with the new setup of the MCL36. Andreas Seidel, McLaren Team Principal explained the following about the new car:
“Our objective for this season is clear and consistent with that of previous years: we want to further close the gap to the front of the pack. At the same time, we know and respect the tough competition we’ll face and have a realistic view of where we are on our journey.
“We’re working through a package of key infrastructure investments, which will provide us with the tools required to compete at the top of our sport when they come online.”
On the day of testing, McLaren did not make the fastest laps until the last few hours of the event. Norris achieved multiple lap time times, all of which would have beaten the other 16 drivers but from what we can see from his last lap on soft tyres, there seems to be a lot more to give over the next few days.
How do you think things will pan out over the next few days?
