Lando Norris is convinced that the McLaren MCL39 will be “competitive at most” circuits over the course of the F1 2025 season.

Yet he feels there will still be at least “a couple” where the team will “struggle” despite their status as title favourites.

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McLaren hit home their advantage at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix, where Norris and team-mate Oscar Piastri secured a front-row lockout with a gap of 0.385 seconds to the third-placed Red Bull of Max Verstappen.

Piastri surrendered second place to Verstappen with a costly spin in treacherous conditions, ultimately finishing a distant ninth, but Norris managed to withstand the reigning World Champion to secure a fifth career victory.

Norris’s win sees him lead the Drivers’ standings for the first time in his career, with Verstappen losing the lead of the World Championship for the first time since May 2022.

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Appearing in the post-race press conference in Melbourne, Norris claimed that McLaren have produced a car quick at “all types of circuits” for F1 2025.

Yet he warned that the team may still have occasional off weekends, citing McLaren’s “shocking” performance at last year’s Las Vegas Grand Prix.

Asked if he feels there are circuits coming up where McLaren may struggle more, he said: “I do, but I think we’ll have both.

“I think we’ll have tracks where we will be even better and I think we’ll have a couple where we’ll struggle.

“We were good last year, especially in the second half of the season, but Vegas was woeful. In fact, we were shocking.

“There are other tracks along those lines where we did struggle quite a bit.

“We’ve definitely made our car much more balanced across all types of circuits – high speed, low speed, high downforce, low downforce. We’re competitive at most.

“But these low grip tracks like Vegas, we really struggled. It highlighted our issues with the front of the car – the graining, the lack of rotation.

“We know that, though. We know where we’re going to struggle.

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“Even in Bahrain a couple of weeks ago, we came out confident, but everyone was hyping us up a lot. Mainly just because our high-fuel pace was very strong. But on low fuel, we were struggling. We were not as quick as some of the others.

“Even if we took all our fuel out and max the engine mode, I don’t think we would have been quicker.

“We know we have work to do. If we raced in Bahrain again, I wouldn’t be confident we could win the race.

“But I’m confident that when we go to China next weekend, we can be very strong, because we were strong there last year with not a very good car.

“So, a mixture. But I hope not. Vegas was our worst last season, so I’m hoping we’ll improve by then.”

Norris claimed an impressive second place in China last season, splitting the dominant Red Bulls of Verstappen and then-team-mate Sergio Perez on the podium.

The McLaren driver also set pole position for the sprint race in Shanghai, which will again host the first of six sprint races in 2025 this weekend.

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