According to Eric Boullier McLaren’s racing director, Lando Norris has shown tremendous potential and could be a “star of the future”. Norris is a Formula 3 leader and was testing for McLaren during the F1 post-Hungarian GP test.
He completed 91 laps during the testing and clocked the second quickest lap of the race at 1m17.385s,. He was just 0.271s longer than the Hungarian GP winner Vettel. Vettel was on soft tyres while Norris was using ultra soft.
Boullier said, “Lando has impressed us all with his maturity, professionalism and speed, and has got to grips very quickly with the car in only his first outing in the MCL32,”.
“His feedback with the engineers has been valuable and accurate, and he’s certainly an asset to our test driver line-up – not to mention a potential star of the future.”
Aerodynamic data gathering, set-up adjustments, high-fuel longer runs and single-lap pace are some of the things Norris completed during this test race.
Norris drove a 2011 McLaren MP4-26 in Portugal early this year to prepare for the Hungarian in season testing. He said, “It’s been a really good day – and a very productive one for all of us,”.
“I managed to get through all the tests that the team asked me to complete, and everything went well.
“Getting used to the car was a bit of a challenge at first, but by the end of the day, I felt very comfortable. I got a lot of laps under my belt and I really enjoyed the experience.
“Finally, I want to say a big thanks to the team for giving me this opportunity. Hopefully, it will be the first of many!”
Norris won the test as a part of the 2016 McLaren Autosport BRDC Award. The winning entails a role as a test and simulator driver.
