Lando Norris enters this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix as the strong favourite. He’s gunning for McLaren’s first Melbourne victory since 2012.
Norris has bemoaned McLaren’s ‘shocking’ starts in recent years, but they have a perfect chance to correct that this year. The overwhelming consensus in the paddock is that they’re a couple of tenths clear before the season opener.
Indeed, ‘everybody’ inside F1 thinks McLaren are the team to beat on the back of testing. Neither driver was especially impressive over a single lap – Norris was 17th and Oscar Piastri eighth when sorted by best times – but they only really showed their hand in the long runs.
Reigning world champion Max Verstappen says McLaren are the only contenders right now. He believes that can change over the course of the season, but the Woking outfit can establish an early cushion.
Indeed, even the most optimistic staff at Red Bull don’t expect to win the Australian GP. Norris may look to replicate Verstappen’s 2024 season by flying out of the blocks and then defending his lead.
Ted Kravitz expects a McLaren one-two this weekend, though he wouldn’t choose an order for the two drivers. He’s then backed Mercedes star George Russell to finish third.
Lando Norris would beat Kimi Antonelli by 30 seconds based on McLaren pace
Mercedes won four races last year – only one fewer than runner-up Ferrari – but they still finished nearly 200 points adrift of McLaren. This is their final chance to build a ground-effect car worthy of challenging.
Based on testing, they’ve made a leap. Bradley Lord ranked Mercedes third fastest after testing, which indicates that, by their own projections, they’re ahead of Ferrari or Red Bull.
However, as a report from Auto Motor und Sport notes, progress in F1 is relative. Even if they find half a second over the winter, it will matter little should rivals to the same.
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And despite the renewed optimism, Mercedes engineers were ‘shocked’ to see that Norris would have beaten Kimi Antonelli by ‘half a minute’ based on the race simulations. They each carried out their long runs in similar conditions on day two.
On the third day, Russell went head-to-head with Oscar Piastri and lost out by 20 seconds. This indicates that the gap between Mercedes and McLaren is somewhere between 0.3 and 0.5s per lap on high fuel.
Damon Hill sends ‘trap’ warning to Lando Norris ahead of Australian Grand Prix
It looks as if McLaren will have a healthy margin for error this weekend, more so than they did last season. Even if they don’t execute perfectly, they may still be too fast for their competitors.
Unreliability is unlikely to stop them either. McLaren have made an ‘extreme’ front suspension change that will put the front of the car under intense load, but the teams generally look more bulletproof than ever this season.
None of the hype will be helpful to Norris, who will be acutely aware that he hasn’t won anything yet. And Verstappen remains the driver to beat after four straight titles.
Damon Hill has warned Norris not to fall into Verstappen’s trap again this year. He thought he was racing against his ‘mate’ at times, but he will now be more prepared for the Dutchman’s ruthlessness.
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