McLaren downplay Lando Norris’ strategy complaints: ‘Ferrari have a faster car’

McLaren F1 boss Andrea Stella feels that Lando Norris lost out to Charles Leclerc on pure performance rather than strategy.

Despite out-qualifying and leading Leclerc in the early phase of the race, Norris was ultimately beaten by the Ferrari driver to second-place.

After the race on Sunday, Norris thought that McLaren lost out to Ferrari on strategy at Albert Park.

He said: "I think when you take the Red Bull out of it, I would say [it was not a surprise]. I think our pace has been good all weekend.

"We put things together very nicely yesterday and showed a good long run pace on Friday. So I wouldn't have said we had no chance. I didn't expect for us to be competing against the Ferraris today and I think our pace was not as good as Carlos's, but probably better than Charles'.

"Being honest, we maybe missed out a little bit on an opportunity to be P2 today. For us to say that, it's a good sign and I think it's a good positive for the whole team, a good boost."

Stella explained McLaren were “aggressive” with their strategy choices on Sunday, highlighting their decision to stop Oscar Piastri at the same time as Leclerc.

"It's possible. It's possible. That was very, very early in the race, a race with a high degree of uncertainty as to the behaviour of the hard tyres.

"And in fact, we saw that there were certainly some big cars that didn't look quick at all because they were not working well with the tyres - one is the Red Bull of [Sergio] Perez [who finished fifth].

"So, I think we actually went for this aggressive strategy, trying to pass Leclerc with Oscar. But Leclerc decided that it was a good idea as well. And they went at the same time - potentially, because of listening to our radio.

"This also meant that Leclerc and Oscar would have gone below two cars fighting each other. So, with Lando in a strong position, we thought that was an unnecessary risk."

Strategy aside, Stella thinks Ferrari simply had the quicker car in Australia, but remains hopeful of being even more competitive next time out at Suzuka.

"Leclerc finished ahead of Lando because they have a faster car at the moment," he added.

"The positive news is that this faster car is not faster by much at all. We were very close, which I think is encouraging for Japan in which some of the characteristics that make Australia good for us take another step further in having a higher ratio of medium-high-speed [corners] compared to low-speed."