Lando Norris expects Max Verstappen will be a significant threat again in this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix as the track layout will play to Red Bull’s strengths.
The McLaren driver said the Red Bull’s superior performance in low-speed corners prevented him from getting close to Verstappen throughout Sunday’s race. The Bahrain International Circuit features a higher proportion of lower-speed corners than Suzuka.“Our weakness was the slow-speed compared to them,” said Norris after Sunday’s race. “There’s a lot less high-speed [in Bahrain], so we’re kind of losing some of our strengths and we’re going more into our weaknesses.”
Norris believes Red Bull have improved their car since the beginning of the season, after Verstappen narrowly beat him and team mate Oscar Piastri to pole position in Japan.
“Clearly, they’re quick,” he said. “I feel like between Oscar and myself, we got a lot out of the car [in qualifying]. It was probably a little bit more, yes, but both our theoretical [lap times] were not that far ahead.
“So Max is doing a good job and Red Bull seemed to maybe have caught up a little bit. But they’ve also not been that bad the whole season.
“When you look at Australia, he was fighting for a win. When you look at China, he wasn’t miles away. And this weekend he’s done very good. So I expect him to be challenging us every weekend.”
McLaren have “got areas to work on” with their car, he added. “In high-speed [corners] we were very, very strong and I think definitely the strongest car out there.
“In slow-speed we’re quite a chunk off the Red Bull, and that’s where we lost in qualifying. We lost again consistently in the race. So there’s a lot of areas we have to try to work on.”
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BasCB (@bascb)
8th April 2025, 7:30
Hm, well, we’ll see. But if McLaren keep “playing it safe” and let’s Max win without even trying to get past, they will simply be behind him all year.
MacLeod (@macleod)
8th April 2025, 7:50
Words of wisdom indeed but to be Sirius (serious HP joke) Bahrain has 2 low speed corners but a lot of medium speedcorners so that should be more McLaren terrain.
Christopher Rehn (@chrischrill)
8th April 2025, 8:00
Bahrain has at least 3 low-speed corners (turn 1, 8, and 9/10). But even 4, 13 and 14/15 could be considered low-ish enough to play to Red Bull’s strengths. The McLaren boys should be faster through 5-7 and realistically 11-13. This is historically an acceleration-heavy track, I am interested in seeing what Ferrari can do here.
Coventry Climax
8th April 2025, 10:27
It all depends on track temperature, quality of tarmac and how the Pirellis that are brought need to be handled to survive that. Obviously, things may change, but at the start, the McLarens were better with tyres than the Red Bulls. Japan’s cool temperatures and less abrasive resurfacing made their win possible.
Mooa42
8th April 2025, 8:16
Last year at Suzuka the RedBull really struggled on the kerbs, Mclaren could smash the curbs on the chicane and Verstappen had to dodge them every lap, no issue with kerbs for Max this year, the car looked well planted. Curious why he had such good slow speed corner exit with such a low down-force setting.
Dex
8th April 2025, 9:28
Because of the way he enters the corner. Plus downforce depends on the speed anyway.
Davethechicken
8th April 2025, 13:44
It is the way the car allows him to enter the corner.
A driver can only use what the car has. They can’t add anything. Max/Red Bull was gaining 1-2 tenths in the Suzuka hairpin on McLarens.
Jere (@jerejj)
8th April 2025, 8:37
We’ll see.
DB-C90 (@dbradock)
8th April 2025, 9:13
Gee that almost sounds as if he’s channeling Toto with the ‘their car will be better than ours’ back in the days when Merc cars were virtually untouchable.
Dex
8th April 2025, 9:38
I thought of Toto too. But Mercedes were coy and knew what they were doing. When it comes from Lando it sounds more like an excuse, just in case.
I think that having the dominant car is the worst thing that ever happened to him. It’s too much pressure, and yet it may not be enough. In his position you can only lose, and he often sounds like he thinks he will lose. And unlike with Toto and Hamilton back in the days when they had the ultimate car, I believe him.
S Arkazam
8th April 2025, 12:22
Piastri is probably the weaker of the two drivers in the team, but he might prevail in a superior car based on his mental strength of being able to cope with pressure better.
Ferdi
8th April 2025, 9:41
Lol, that was my first thought as well. Tiresome narrative that was back in the days.
slowmo (@slowmo)
8th April 2025, 10:00
Queue up those excuses Norris for when you again fail to win in the fastest car. Not so easy winning with the fastest car every week is it despite your earlier boasts about others successes in the sport.
Bullfrog (@bullfrog)
8th April 2025, 11:18
It’s between two drivers who aren’t wasting energy talking themselves down, then: Verstappen and Piastri.
But I’d love to see a fourth different winner in 4 races. Mercedes seem more likely than Ferrari so if anyone it would be Russell. And, of course, from pre-season Bahrain testing, the Williams is fastest of all…
tielemst
8th April 2025, 13:11
Lando, let’s not forget that the win by Verstappen, as good as that drive was, should not have happened at all. The McLaren was fastest in all sectors of Suzuka, but both you and Piastri made a critical mistake in one of the sectors. Verstappen is doing nothing more than picking up the pieces that are left by the McLarens (and doing a great job of it). That car is of course pretty good, but I’m afraid what Verstappen said was cheeky but very true: “if I would have been in that other car and you wouldn’t have seen me again”. That’s on you and Oscar, not on the car.
Davethechicken
8th April 2025, 13:51
You are right in that McLaren lost on the Saturday as their drivers made errors. On Sunday Max was comfortable. No Mclaren strategy would have worked, they never once got into his DRS. Not once.
We have had 3 races and the Red Bull looks a fantastic car too, there is little if anything between McLaren and Red Bull, with Mercedes a fair bit behind and Ferrari distant 4th. Lewis sprint pole and win was actually a remarkable achievement with hindsight.
McLaren seem to have better tyre wear on the basis on Aus and China but as degradation was low there was no meaningful advantage in Japan.
baasbas
8th April 2025, 16:08
@Davethechicken
I think you’re too dismissive, that no strategy would have worked. It’s 2 vs 1. They knew that before the race started. It was estimated that a .8 second delta was needed to make an overtake work. They didn’t have that over Verstappen. But they sure had anything around .2 and .4. So what do you do, talk scenario’s. One goes for the undercut, the other for the overcut. Get a couple of laps in where you can utilise the speed difference in free air and you’re ahead. Now this plan fails if Verstappen had .4 in his pocket. I think he didn’t and towards the end of the race it showed. But to not even try this from McLaren viewpoint….. A serious go for a 1-3 was on the tables and if that would fail, they’d still have the 2-3 they already had. For me Saturday was on the drivers but Sunday was on the team.
Davethechicken
8th April 2025, 16:46
Yeah, I do get your point but the undercut wasn’t worth the 1.5 sec a lap it needed to succeed and the overrcut was never a realistic prospect, Lando would have been slower than Max on new tyres.
Factor in the lack of field spread and the midfield not pitting before the leaders and there was no window to drop either Piastri or Norris into. If Norris pitted before Piastri he would not have gained track position on Max as he would have come out just behind Bearman and lost time.
Also Russell attempted the undercut on Piastri so McLaren were forced to pit him when they did before Lando or face losing track position to Russell and potentially Leclerc.
It was much more nuanced than the baying crowd are suggesting.
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
8th April 2025, 17:34
I don’t know why the McLarens didn’t use the DRS between the 2 cars to get in DRS range of VER. They were too busy ensuring NOR 2nd place.
Velocityboy (@velocityboy)
8th April 2025, 14:53
A bit early to start with the excuses, but I guess he’s trying to avoid the queue.
RH
8th April 2025, 17:18
Lol good attempt.
Verstappen is probably the only driver I can recall in recent times do a full race with a car 1.5s behind without making a single error. This kind of drive is common for him but no one else. Or maybe I’m just misremembering. Last year at Qatar was similar. In 2022 he was hunting Charles before Charles binned it in France.
Man really does make tough things look smooth and easy and he’s so good that he’s made some people believe Red Bull is better than McLaren lol
Addme (@dontme)
8th April 2025, 18:48
Not sure why people comment that Norris is making excuses. It’s just an observation that many agree with. The rest of his comments are also normal. Nobody can say anything anymore this way if people just going to invent their own meaning.