Lando Norris has cautioned against the expectation that McLaren will immediately be able to challenge Mercedes in Canada, owing to a major unknown.
The world champion secured the first non-Mercedes win of the year by claiming victory in the Miami GP Sprint, and then chased Kimi Antonelli home for the second-half of the grand prix itself, with McLaren only delivering half of its huge upgrade.
The rest is set to be delivered this coming weekend in Montreal, but Mercedes held back its own upgrades for Canada, which, as Norris pointed out, has a major difference to Miami, which could throw a spanner into the expectation of McLaren immediately being able to challenge Antonelli and George Russell.
“We will certainly give it a good shot; we were certainly closer in Miami, and that leads everyone to quite easily think we can challenge them here,” Norris told media, including ApexF1News, of the chance to challenge Mercedes.
“I don’t want to get ahead of ourselves just yet because we know how good Mercedes has been, not just last year, but over the last three, four, five years. Mercedes has been incredibly strong here.
“They also have their upgrades, and we need to see how the upgrades that we had in Miami translate to a much lower grip tarmac. Miami is very high-grip.
“The tarmac here is much lower grip, so we just need to understand how well the car will translate between those two worlds, and you have to make sure that the upgrades we are bringing this weekend will help move the car in the right direction.
“But we are confident it will; we just don’t want to get ahead of ourselves, but of course we want to beat Mercedes, we want to beat everyone on track.
“It is also a place where you can easily see Ferrari challenge for a good result and potentially Red Bull at the same time, so we’re just fully focused on trying to deliver the parts, make sure everything works and get the maximum out of the car.
“If we can do that, then I feel confident that we can at least give them a good challenge.”
