Lando Norris says Saturday is the “important day” for McLaren after a subdued practice at the Spanish Grand Prix.
The Briton, who finished in the top five at all three races so far this season, was only 12th fastest on Friday afternoon in Barcelona, one of his lowest results in any session in 2021.
Despite, that Norris wasn’t overly concerned as he indicated McLaren were on a different program to many of their midfield rivals.
“It’s not been a bad day,” he said via Formula1.com.
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“I think FP1 we were a little bit more confident, or we were just a little bit quicker in FP1. FP2 when the temperature came up, we maybe just struggled a little bit more, but the car doesn’t feel bad.
“We brought a few different things for this weekend, so we just need to understand them for tonight.
“It’s still the fourth race of the season, fourth track of the season, so still exploring different characteristics, different tarmacs and stuff like that… But tomorrow’s the important day, and that’s when we’ve got to put it all together.”
Teammate Daniel Ricciardo was only a tenth slower than Norris and did feel like more progress was being made as he adapts to the McLaren car.
“On paper, it doesn’t look great but it certainly was better this afternoon,” said the Australian.
“15th, but I think it’s one second to first, it’s so close that it shows that not only is F1 close this year amongst all teams, but it’s a track that everyone knows so well, so it’s just small margins.
“I think this morning I struggled just getting kind of comfortable, I guess, or confident,” he conceded. “I was a bit off and we were just chasing some rear grip essentially, kind of fighting the car and not really having the confidence to push it.
“I think we addressed it this afternoon. I do think the car was better, and we made a step. Clearly a step is not enough and we’ve got to make another one because if we’re a second off, we might be back here [in P15]… but I think we’ll be better off, and for now we’ll get some work done and find some tenths. Or a second!”
McLaren boss Andreas Seidl also voiced confidence in Ricciardo to start producing the speed he is known for sooner rather than later.
“He’s the one who is probably disappointed the most because he knows he has it in him,” he said.
“He’s disappointed that he can’t extract the performance of our car yet, but at the same time, he’s very experienced. I think we are also very experienced on the team side it’s simply important to stay calm, work through this integration or adoption process together as a team.
“I think he feels very comfortable and happy in the team. I think he’s also very happy with how we together deal with this current challenge, together,” the German added.
“And again, I’m 100 per cent sure it is just a matter of more time and then we will see Daniel back to the performance which we all know.”