McLaren completes productive first day of pre-season testing as Norris tops the timing board

McLaren F1 Team had a successful first day of testing, as Lando Norris took on both of today’s sessions and ended the day with 103 laps completed and the lead lap time. Norris’s time of 1:19.568 placed him over half a second ahead of the second place runner, Charles Leclerc.

“I’m really happy to be back behind the wheel. It’s nice to be in the car again and get to push the limit. It’s been good for me to get used to this new car, because I’ve driven the same regulations for my whole F1 career,” Norris said. 

“It’s nice to have a change and it was a productive day. We learned a lot of things for the team, and we got all the information we wanted to. We can now compare it back to the simulator and the wind tunnel. A good day, and a good start to this test.”

McLaren may have finished out the day on top, but lap times were not of significance for James Key, McLaren’s Executive Director, Technical, who focused more on learning about the new car and collecting data. 

“This has been a productive first day for us. We’re not taking any notice of lap times at the moment, it’s all about learning and following our own directions and priorities. We gathered some important data points during this first day of testing and learned a great deal, both to carry forward for the rest of this test and also to use as we develop the car further.”

Key said that the team did set-up work to get to know the car throughout the sessions, and aerodynamics were a focus when it came to today’s data collection. 

“Like many teams, we undertook initial runs with aero rakes on the car this morning which provided some useful initial correlation data. Aerodynamics is the biggest change with the ’22 cars so it is important to take some basic initial measurements at an early stage. Through the rest of the day, we did a fair amount of set-up and exploratory work, beginning to understand the car and the tyres a step at a time. I think we can be pleased with the number of laps we’ve covered with Lando today and look forward to going again with Daniel tomorrow.”

Key was excited to see MCL36 in action and see all the teams out on track together for the very first sessions of the new era. 

“After two years in the design process, it’s great to finally see the MCL36 on track, alongside all of the other new cars. It’s remarkable how many laps have been completed by teams today, considering how new these cars are, and how much there is to learn. It’s good to see F1 getting winter testing off to such a positive start.