A Surprise in Second
McLaren may not be back for good, but it sure is sweet
First, it was Aston Martin, then it was Mercedes and now it’s McLaren. The championship may not be up for grabs, but will the third unlikely team challenge Red Bull on track?
Lando Norris (McLaren) finished second on Sunday, closely behind Max Verstappen (Red Bull). The Brit’s home race marked his seventh podium in five years.
Norris built on his tremendous result from the previous race, topping Saturday’s qualifying session briefly before dropping to second. McLaren’s second driver and rookie, Oscar Piastri, closely followed his teammate and qualified third.
While Norris launched forward at the race start and held the lead for five laps, Piastri fell back to fourth where he eventually finished. The performance was a step forward after Piastri’s 16th-place finish in Austria and retirement in the first race of the season.
The team gained more points in Silverstone than all of the previous races combined this season.
Once a title contender, McLaren fell off in 2012 after consistently finishing second or third in the World Constructors’ Championship the previous decade. 2020 looked hopeful, with a third-place championship standing, but Carlos Sainz’s departure to Ferrari paired with an underperforming Daniel Ricciardo and a new Mercedes engine meant progress unraveled.
McLaren has experimented with four engine supplier changes in less than 10 years. The team’s return to Mercedes in 2021—the same engine supplier that won the UK-based team the 1998 title—may be finally paying off.
While the upgrades—including a side pod entrance and improved side pods, an altered Halo, a new floor, an advanced front wing and an engine cover—have drastically improved both drivers’ performances, neither Norris nor Piastri were particularly pleased with the unexpected result.
Norris has mentioned previously that he is fearful of crashing around each corner; the second-place finish was momentous but an unenjoyable drive tainted celebrations.
“We do have a poor car. We’re pretty terrible in the slow-speed corners,” Norris said in the post-race press conference. “We’re getting excited and I accept that, but we’re going to a couple tracks coming up where I’m sure people are going to be left saying ‘Ah, what have you done now? How has it gotten so bad all of a sudden?’”
Alex Albon (Williams) had the opposite reaction: a P7 result had the Thai-British driver grinning post-race. Unlike the two McLarens, he expressed how much fun he had cruising around the Silverstone circuit.
“It was a great race,” Albon said. “I enjoyed it a lot.”
Williams was the second surprise team that jumped to the top of qualifying this weekend. Once dominant and battling for the championship, the British racing team finished tenth in the championship standings last year.
Albon had an impressive fourth-place finish in the second qualifying session (Q2), sending him into Q3 where he finished eighth. Albon’s teammate, Logan Sargeant, qualified in 14th ahead of a Red Bull. Despite failing to compete in Q3, at one point Sargeant hit the fourth fastest time in the second qualifying session.
Both mid-tier teams—McLaren and Williams—challenged the two Red Bulls in qualifying and the main event.
Verstappen crossed the checkered flag only 3.798 seconds ahead of Norris, one of the smallest gaps all season between first and second.
The Dutch driver and two-time Driver’s World Champion blamed his unlucky start on wheel spin and complained about the difficulty of keeping the soft tires under control.
When asked about what upgrades Red Bull can bring, Verstappen showed his drive for perfection.
“Drag, low speed, medium speed, high speed, DRS effect, tire wear. All of these areas; that’s what we’re working on,” Verstappen listed. “…Braking performance. I’m not kidding.”
Norris also had a bone to pick with the tire strategy. With 18 laps to go, the crew fitted the second-place driver with hards rather than a malleable and quick soft tire set.
“I feel like we put ourselves under a lot more pressure to try and get a hard tire to work when the safety car restarted with only 10 laps to go,” Norris said.
With a small gap, a set of soft tires could have inched the McLaren closer to a top podium step.
“We’re very very competitive in high speed,” Norris added. “We’re almost on par with what Red Bull can achieve”
Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) and Zhou Guanyu (Alfa Romeo) had botched pit strategies as well.
Leclerc, finishing ninth after qualifying fourth, pitted early with 33 laps to go. The tight field and eventual safety car—a result of Kevin Magnussen’s (Haas) engine failure—caused the Monegasque driver to fall down the leaderboard.
The Alfa Romeo pitted four times—a combination of safety car implications and brake duct issues.
While the two dropped in points, Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) and Sergio “Checo” Perez (Red Bull) rushed forward.
Hamilton, starting seventh, dropped to tenth after what he called “one of the worst opening laps” he’d had in a while. A combination of locked rear tires and a wide run off the racing line in turn three meant the seven-time World Champion couldn’t make up positions as the lights went out.
Hamilton, however, hurdled seven places and finished behind Norris in third. With better speed and a sophisticated defense, Norris blocked Hamilton from passing.
“That McLaren is a rocket ship,” Hamilton said. “That speed is insane.”
Perez, starting in 15th, jumped to sixth behind George Russell’s Mercedes.
The race didn’t test drivers’ ability to stay within track limits like last Sunday’s race in Austria, but there were a couple sets of tires over the white lines. Norris and Lance Stroll’s (Aston Martin) laps were flagged for exceeding the confines of the track.
Stroll was also investigated for swerving off track to gain a position over Pierre Gasly (Alpine) and clipping the French driver’s car, resulting in a broken suspension and retirement.
No penalties were handed out. In response to Gasly deeming the lack of punishment unfair, Stroll joked that the two could meet in the parking lot after the race to sort out their differences.
As the next two races bring the first half of the season to a close, the fight for the last two championship podiums may have more contenders.
While Red Bull leads Mercedes by a whopping 208 points, Aston Martin and Ferrari linger nearby the second-place team with 181 and 157 points respectively.
As Hungary approaches—a track well-suited to McLaren in qualifying—and the future looks bright for the papaya orange team, Norris may be a returning guest on the podium. However, McLaren remains nearly 100 points below Ferrari.
Cover photo courtesy of F1’s official Instagram.