McLaren: Lando Norris had outright pace for second in…

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said his team has been positively surprised by its pace in the Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix, feeling seventh-placed Lando Norris could have finished second without his grid penalty.

Norris took a 10-place grid drop after taking a new Mercedes battery for the Spa weekend, exceeding his allowance for the year due to previous reliability issues.

While McLaren felt high-speed Spa-Francorchamps was a circuit where overtaking would be more straight-forward for Norris to overcome his grid penalty, it wasn't too sure about its form at the Ardennes track after struggling in Silverstone.

But Norris was rapid in qualifying, taking third behind polesitter Kimi Antonelli and Red Bull's Max Verstappen, who benefitted from a tow by team-mate Isack Hadjar, and in the race the reigning world champion also showed impressive pace for McLaren on the alternate strategy of starting on hards before a stop to mediums past halfway.

According to team boss Stella, Norris could have contended for the podium on outright pace if it hadn't been for his grid drop.

"We are very encouraged by the pace that Lando was able to deliver today," Stella said. "The car had the pace in qualifying. And based on what we saw today, it had the pace in the race to contend for podiums."

(Photo by: Steven Tee / LAT Images via Getty Images)

But Norris could have also been much closer to the podium even with his grid penalty. Under a mid-race virtual safety car McLaren decided to keep him out instead of benefitting from the opportunity to take a cheaper pitstop.

Part of the reasoning was the prospect of covering just over half the race on a single set of mediums, while the other part was McLaren covering itself for the potential of a later safety car. Either way, Norris' slow 7.8s stop further dented his chances of a podium bid.

With the benefit of hindsight, Stella did concede that McLaren should have pitted Norris under the VSC. "I think we should have given it a go, because Lando ultimately lost some time being overtaken while staying out, and there was no further safety car," Stella acknowledged.

"In the case of [another] safety car, the strategy would have worked well, because now Lando saves the time at the stop, he finds himself on new tyres with other people on used hards. But this didn't happen.

"At the time, we were a little concerned about such a long stint on the medium tyres. It was very much a 50-50 [decision], we wanted to avoid Lando to lose the time of the double stack at the pit stop. In hindsight, it was probably better to pit."

Oscar Piastri sustained damage after being squeezed by Charles Leclerc. (Photo by: Clive Rose / Formula 1 via Getty Images)

Stella credited McLaren's improvement relative to its competitors to Spa's different grip levels and the team's better exploitation of its Mercedes power unit, while Ferrari's power deficit was more pronounced at Spa and it had fewer corners to make up for it.

"I think the car adapted well to Belgium and it's not like now we go back to Silverstone and we are in condition to compete for podiums in Silverstone," he explained. "We are, at the moment, susceptible to the track conditions, the level of grip. And our objective is to make sure that we are independent of this variability, and we can compete for podiums because the car is strong enough to do it in every condition."

Team-mate Oscar Piastri endured a frustrating afternoon, suffering car damage after being squeezed at Turn 5 by Ferrari's Charles Leclerc. Piastri's subsequent loss of downforce particularly hurt him in traffic behind other cars as he finished fifth behind Lewis Hamilton, moving up one position due to George Russell's lap 1 retirement.