Lando Norris explained that a still-unconfirmed issue with his McLaren forced him to abandon a charge for the lead of the Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The Brit finished second at the Sin City night race to Max Verstappen, who capitalised on a mistake from the #4 McLaren at the first corner.
Verstappen cruised to victory by 17 seconds, after Norris was forced to work for second, having also lost out to George Russell on the opening lap.
Norris was told to push after his tyre stop, and looked set to home in on Verstappen, who was five seconds up the road, but began to back off.
The lifting and coasting Norris was forced into saw him cross the line 17 seconds behind Verstappen, just two seconds ahead of Russell, who had been 10 seconds behind.
After the race, Norris revealed that “some issues with the car” were relayed back to him by race engineer Will Joseph, and he was forced to “back off a bit”.
Russell was suffering from power steering issues, which, as Norris recognised, was helpful under his own circumstances, which appeared to be caused by a fuel-related issue.
“I’m pretty thankful George was also having issues,” he quipped to media including Motorsport Week. “Otherwise, today would have been even worse. So, I’m not sure how close it was.
“I don’t know if the sensor was saying things it shouldn’t have been or what. Or we just used more than expected or what it was.
“So, I don’t know the full extent. I need to go and see the team and understand more, to be honest.
“So, it was more I was just annoyingly listening to what they were telling me to do, which was losing a lot of pace.
“And yeah, certainly didn’t help in the chance to try and attack Max a bit more.”
Irked Norris admits Verstappen and Red Bull ‘were much quicker than us’
When asked if he was able to take comfort from the fact that team-mate Oscar Piastri was fourth, giving him an extended championship lead despite his win, a dejected Norris rued that Verstappen and Red Bull were just simply the better package on the day.
“I was all out,” he said. “We just weren’t quick enough. They were just much quicker than us today. Not miles, but we certainly had our issues and that made the gap probably bigger than it was.
“But otherwise, they were just quicker. Even if I came out of Turn 1 ahead, I don’t think we would have won the race today. So, I still take P2 as a good result.
“I’m pretty happy because of it. But I’m not happy because it’s P2. And like Max says, it’s tough, it’s close. And I gave myself a good opportunity yesterday to try to win the race.
“Of course, I messed it up and made my life tougher into Turn 1. But even after that, we just weren’t quick enough. Even when I thought I kept the tyres in a better condition than the others, I kind of brought them in nicer.
“I was pushing flat out and Max was still pulling away. So, it seems like lately we’ve been able to improve our quali pace, but our race pace has taken a bit of a hit.
“Even when you look at Brazil, like our quali pace was very strong, but Max was still a lot faster in the race. Similar this weekend.
“Like we were very, very good yesterday. Like incredibly strong yesterday, but just not good enough today. So, we’ll we’ll see what’s maybe changed over the last few weeks and what we can improve on for Qatar.”
Norris appeared to be unaffected by his extended title lead, instead irritated by his first-corner mistake and losing out on the win. Asked if he dared to dream that he could now secure the title, having earned a 30-point advantage on Piastri, he confirmed that he did not.
“No, I’m just pretty disappointed with today,” he said. “So no, I look forward to Qatar.
“I look forward to getting somewhere warm and, yeah, just go play some golf, go play some paddle for a few days, enjoy a few days off and, yeah, do everything we can to try and win in Qatar.”
READ MORE – Max Verstappen keeps F1 title hopes alive with Las Vegas GP win
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