Norris identifies key area of improvement despite gains: "It’s on a knife edge"

McLaren have enjoyed remarkable progress in F1 2023, going from the back of the grid in Bahrain to contend for regular podiums in recent races.

It has meant the team sit just 11 points behind Aston Martin in the constructors’ championship, while Ferrari are just 79 points ahead.

Even though the McLaren has improved considerably in terms of pace, Norris noted that it’s still difficult to drive and the inherent handling characteristics have stayed the same.

“I think at the minute, that’s our next target with our development is still to make it a bit quicker, but also just to make the car a bit easier to drive in different conditions because both Oscar and my comments are still, like, you have to drive a car like this, it’s on a knife edge; if you’re not pushing to 100% you’re just slow,” he explained. 

“So I feel like we’re doing a good job finding that level, but it’s just very difficult as soon as conditions change to this, we either go one way off this knife and they were just struggling a bit more. Finding that consistency is our next target and I think that all kind of ties together.”

Norris has admitted that “small details” are where McLaren need to focus on to close the gap to Red Bull.

“For where we are, for what I feel like we still want to achieve, for what we have done in the season, before we really focus on the smaller details, even for what we have a lot of it is small details that make this big difference," he added.

“But the smaller details in terms of making the driver a bit happier rather than just making the car quick. But like I said the other day, I’d rather have a quick car and a tricky one to drive than vice versa: a slow car to drive and a nice car to drive.

“But I think this want of making the car a bit more drivable, a bit more rounded, I think that’s almost the hardest task to achieve because it is so difficult to do this without compromise.

“It’s such a difficult thing to have the front end strong here, but then not to be too strong that you struggle on the exit because then the rear needs to be better.”