Lando Norris says McLaren upgrades delivered immediate performance in Sao Paulo

Now, that is how you kick off a race weekend. McLaren rolled into the Autódromo José Carlos Pace with a fresh batch of modifications bolted to the machine, and according to Lando Norris, the garage's hard work has paid off with an immediate injection of pace.

After slipping back from the frontrunners in recent rounds, the team introduced these parts to extract more speed and hopefully tame the MCL40. It certainly looked the part right out of the box. Norris charged to the top of the timesheets in the opening one-hour session, edging out newly crowned World Champion Kimi Antonelli by a margin of less than one-tenth. He followed that up by slotting into second place in Free Practice 2, finishing two tenths behind the Mercedes driver.

“Upgrades that change kind of a balance and handling, and upgrades that are just there to bring performance, to bring lap time, to make things perform quicker.

Speaking about the new package, Norris was straightforward about the team's progress. "I think FP1 we seemed quite easily on the pace, FP2 maybe struggled a little bit more to match the Mercedes but I think it's been a pretty good start to the weekend," he said. He added that the team has "continued the trend that we had in Mexico," confirming that Friday was dedicated to verifying whether the new components were functioning as intended.

Norris has made no secret of his frustrations with the MCL40 this season, noting repeatedly that while the speed is hidden inside the chassis, it is fiercely difficult to extract when pushing right on the limit. Team mate Oscar Piastri is also tasked with wrestling the machine, but Friday's running offered a glimmer of relief on the balance front. The updates were primarily designed to add load and grip rather than radically alter the handling characteristics, yet the driver reported a noticeably more positive feeling from the cockpit.

"You can have two types of upgrades," Norris explained. "Upgrades that change kind of a balance and handling, and upgrades that are just there to bring performance, to bring lap time, to make things perform quicker." Even though the balance wasn't specifically targeted for a redesign, the extra load brought a slightly different and more welcoming sensation to the driving experience. It remains a tricky beast to drive, but if it translates into pure lap time, nobody in the papaya garage is going to complain.