McLaren’s Lando Norris has said his “worst nightmare” was coming true when his brakes began to act up in the closing stages of the Chinese Grand Prix.

Norris’ comfortable second place came under threat in the closing laps of the Grand Prix in Shanghai, as a brake issue became evident on the McLaren MCL39 – an issue which prevented Norris from mounting any sort of attack on leader Oscar Piastri.

Lando Norris: I was a bit scared!

Circulating around three seconds behind Piastri with 10 laps to go, radio messages began to filter through from Norris’ race engineer Will Joseph telling him that he could expect his brake pedal to get increasingly long over the remainder of the race.

Reassuring Norris that the brakes were still functional, Norris pressed on, but the issue became “critical” towards the race end. With Joseph urging Norris to settle for second and finishing rather than trying to push closer to Piastri, the British driver completely backed off and massaged his car home to finish just ahead of third-place George Russell.

Speaking after the race, Norris explained how the final laps had played out from his perspective.

“It’s scary. It’s like my worst nightmare, you know,” he said.

“Whatever nightmare it’s when the brakes are failing and I was losing two, three, four seconds the last couple of laps.

“So I was a bit scared, but we survived, and then we made it to the end.

“So I would have loved to have given it a little try and put Oscar under a little bit of pressure, but not today.

“So we’re satisfied, great result, and we’ll go again next time.”

Speaking to Sky F1, McLaren team boss Andrea Stella paid tribute to Norris’ versatility to get the car home.

“Around 15 to 20 laps to the end, we started to develop a problem on the brake pedal for Lando,” he said.

“Lando did a very good job, together with the team, to manage through the problem, and adapting the driving style such that it didn’t become a terminal problem but not without some attention.

“We bring home P1 and P2 but it shows that it’s always very marginal and, if anything, there are opportunities to do even better.”

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Elaborating on the issue, Norris said that he could have benefitted from being told about the brake issue earlier.

“I was lucky to finish the race today, which is not something you want to be saying,” he said.

“Brakes are something you hate, but something you really do need, and they can save your life.

“So a sketchy last couple of laps, because the brakes were getting worse and worse every lap, and the last couple laps I was three or four seconds off. So quite nervous.

“I think the team knew about the problem from before – they told me about it, so they wanted to keep me calm. So not good at all from that side, because we’re lucky to have finished the race, but to finish with a one-two makes us very happy, so it’s what we want to come into the weekend with, and it’s all we achieved.

“So a very good day for the team.”

As for whether Norris could have challenged Piastri in the final laps without the brake issues, he said it “didn’t matter” and applauded his teammate’s drive to the win.

“I would have loved to have challenged Oscar today, but he drove well,” he said.

“I had the pace, for sure, especially because in dirty air it’s a lot more tricky, like we’ve seen all weekend.

“But I think the pace was there, but Oscar deserved it completely. Sprint pole yesterday and the win today, so he’s driven very well. A shame about my my brakes in the end, but that’s life, and I take it on the chin and move on.

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