Reigning Formula 1 world champion Lando Norris has admitted that he and McLaren are disappointed by their 2026 performance, despite taking victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix.
Norris and McLaren endured a challenging first half of the 2026 season, with a car that suffers from a narrow operating window and a deficit in high speed corners.
The team has openly admitted that it is as much as three months behind its rivals in the development race, which has left it cut adrift in the standings,. McLaren is currently third in the Constructors’ Championship, 159 points behind leaders Mercedes.
Norris’ championship defence has been far from his mind, as he has battled unreliability and weaknesses with the MCL40, though hopes of a turnaround rose in Hungary.
With new upgrades, Norris took a dominant first win of the year, though he faces an uphill struggle to narrow the 91-point difference between himself and Kimi Antonelli in the second half of the season.
With F1 now in its mandatory summer shutdown, Norris admitted his disappointment in how the first half of the season panned out.
“As a team, and with the car, we’re certainly not quite at the level we want to be at, or we were at last season” he said via a McLaren Q&A.
“We have still had some good results, but we also know we’re not where we should be.
“We’re not happy with that, we’ve been disappointed with our own performance, but we’re working hard to improve.
“We’re starting to see the benefits of that hard work – our win in Hungary came as a result of strong upgrades to the car – but we need to keep pushing and keep developing if we’re going to continue to fight for wins.”
The start of a turnaround for Lando Norris and McLaren?
Norris also admitted a knowledge gap still existed in understanding the characteristics of the MCL40, confirming this remains his and McLaren’s highest priority.
“We still see good potential in the car, and we still believe we can turn things around from where we are now, he said.
“That’s something to look forward to, and that is a positive, but you don’t have all the time in the world in Formula 1 – time is your enemy! – so we need to try and bring those improvements as soon as we can.
“We don’t feel like we have fully clicked with our understanding of this car just yet, but even before our latest upgrade package helped us to secure the win in Hungary, we had already secured some good results.
“We know from the past few years what it is like when you do understand the car and what happens when we can maximise the package. We don’t feel like we have gotten close to that potential yet, so we are excited to really try and understand it completely, which is when we’ll be able to maximise things.
“As has also been in the case in the past, we know when we’re not quite at the front we need to work together as drivers to help the team out develop our competition. Oscar and I often have very similar feedback and we’re working well with the aim of getting McLaren back into contention for wins every weekend.
Despite his victory in Hungary, Norris is refusing to think about “expectations of the future”, instead focused on the immediate goals McLaren has to improve its car.
“One thing I’ve learned for sure is just to have no expectations of the future and just to work in the present. I think that’s the way we’ve been doing everything as a team,” he said.
“That’s why we were back on top in Hungary: just working hard on ourselves as individuals and also as a team.
“Of course, I’m optimistic for the future and I think we can win more races, but we have good competition and there are still plenty of races I’m not confident in because the car is not to the standard that it needs to be in certain areas.
“But I have confidence in the team. I had confidence that we could win a race, and it came a bit sooner than I thought. I have confidence that we can improve in those areas that are not good enough at the time.”
Norris is aware of the expectation surrounding McLaren as he heads into the second half of the season as a race winner.
His admission that the car remains an anomaly to him and the team in some areas is designed to dampen some of that expectation, but this will be difficult in Zandvoort should the MCL40 perform well there when F1 returns from its break.
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