McLaren boss Andrea Stella lauded both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri for their handling of the team’s shocking double non-start at Formula 1‘s Chinese Grand Prix.
The Woking-based squad were looking to bounce back from an underwhelming season-opener in Melbourne, where Norris finished almost a minute off the leaders in fifth.
Piastri’s race was, of course, even worse, as it did not even come to be, as the Australian shocking spun off amid a torque spike on his out lap to the grid, in front of his home fans.
Both were well-placed to put on a good show, locking out the third row of the grid at the Shanghai International Circuit.
But to the utter amazement of everyone, both cars suffered with electrical faults on their Mercedes PU, rendering their races over before they even began.
After the race, Stella admitted that the first two rounds of 2026 have been tough to take, but praised the ‘positivity’ of his two drivers.
“It is a tough moment, that’s for sure,” he said, “like if we consider that Oscar has not been able to start a race in this start of the 2026 campaign, that’s pretty difficult for Oscar to process.
“But at the same time, and this was testified and witnessed in the conversation with Lando and Oscar after the race, both remain quite positive.”
‘Withstanding the difficulties’ key for McLaren mindset
“I think what we have gone through at McLaren in terms of the journey for ’23 is been such a good journey of developing a culture, a mindset, what we call, internally, a winner’s mindset, just a positive attitude and which focuses us on what we can control.
“In this case, there wasn’t much we could have controlled so we just take any possible learning, and we go again.
“And we say, like even looking at last year, when we won the double championship, we said, and I said that publicly but we definitely said internally, the victory was not in Abu Dhabi, the victory was in Qatar and in Vegas, for the way we withstood the difficulties. That’s where you really become a champion.
“So today, this is part of the same part of the journey, which is the day in which you have to withstand the difficulty, you have to process it, and you have to use it to become even more of a worthwhile champion in the future and gain the qualities to be a champion.
“That’s our mindset, and I’ve seen it completely in play today with Oscar, with Lando, and with the team.”
With Mercedes’ PU appearing so far superior and faultless in its works car, McLaren will need to push for improvements both there and in-house if it has any chance of salvaging its season.
READ MORE – McLaren launches investigation as Lando Norris/Oscar Piastri F1 DNS cause revealed
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