Norris reduces running after suffering “a lot of pain” in practice

Lando Norris said he was in “a lot of pain” during practice for the Styrian Grand Prix and reduced the amount of running which was planned for him.

“I’ve been struggling a bit physically with something,” said the McLaren driver. “We’ve had to cut down quite a few of the laps that we were planning to do just to make sure I’m in good condition for tomorrow.”

“It’s just something in my chest or something,” he explained. “I hit the brakes and then the compression, it spikes up massively so I’m just afraid to brake anywhere, which is not ideal around here.

“I don’t know what it is, something we have to look into and try and fix for the race.”

Speaking after the session, Norris said the problem had set him back a lot on the opening day of running.

“I feel fine now and walking around, it’s something that when I’m driving just causes me a lot of pain, particularly in the high-speed corners and when I’m braking. I’ve spoken to my specialist and he tried to figure it out, but it’s not as as obvious as just pointing it out and so on.

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“I’ve been on painkillers and whatever, but it’s been setting me back a lot today, so it’s been pretty frustrating. I’ve not felt confident in the car in terms of pushing it and so on. Hopefully I can get fixed and I’ll be ready for the next one.”

Norris has been given a three-place grid penalty for Sunday’s race for what he called a “silly move” during the first practice session. He was found to have overtaken Pierre Gasly’s AlphaTauri while passing yellow flags which were being waved after Nicholas Latifi’s Williams came to a stop.

“I saw the yellow flag,” said Norris. “I was on a ‘push lap’ at the two other guys were on a slow lap or an out-lap. And they pulled over to let me past knowing that I was on my push lap.

“I let off when I saw the yellow flags and I braked but I just haven’t braked and completely gone to the same speed as them. So I’ve slowed down, I’ve gone away from everyone, I did what I had to do in terms of driving cautiously and being prepared to stop and whatever. But I just rolled a bit more speed than what the other guys did, I ended up passing them.

“So the rules are the rules, a bit unfortunate because I left off, but I just didn’t do everything that I should have done. A bit of a silly move by me.”

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