‘We threw it away’ - Lando Norris’ frustration shows as McLaren squander victory shot

Lando Norris says McLaren “threw away” their shot at winning Sunday’s F1 British Grand Prix.

Norris charged into the lead after overtaking Max Verstappen and Mercedes pair George Russell and Lewis Hamilton during the early stages at Silverstone, but a costly second pit stop ultimately wrecked his chances of victory.

The Briton stayed out a lap longer than his rivals before switching to softs but overshot his pit box which resulted in a slow stop and enabled Hamilton to undercut him.

"We threw it away in the final stop,” Norris admitted to media including Crash.net. "So, one lap, but also I don’t think it was a lap. I think even if I boxed on the perfect lap, our decision to go on to the softs was the wrong one.

“I think Lewis still would have won no matter what. So, two calls from our side cost us everything today. So, pretty, especially here, pretty disappointing.”

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella conceded his side were “too influenced” by Hamilton’s decision to go to softs in a bid to try and cover off the Mercedes driver.

“In those conditions we wanted to check also with Lando what his preference was, what we should be going after and one aspect was also do you think it will be tricky? This we didn't ask,” he explained.

“The sense of asking with Lando, deciding with Lando was will it be tricky going on a C2 compound in these conditions but in fairness as a matter of fact it wasn't that tricky because Verstappen on a hard compound managed the transition to the dry tyres without big issues.

“So I think this one was a decision that from the people we should have taken once again - like in stopping Oscar in the double stack we should have taken the responsibility to say the medium is just the right tyre, we go for it.

“I think in checking with Lando we kind of self-doubted and this led us to follow this direction which in hindsight was important.”

McLaren have had one of the fastest cars in recent races but Norris was convinced the team lacked the pace to win at Silverstone in dry conditions.

“Clearly also weren’t quick enough today,” Norris added. “I think when it was completely dry, the Mercedes was a lot quicker.

“In the more slippery conditions, maybe we seemed to be better. So, we have work to do. We still had a weekend where we’ve clearly been the quickest. We’ve always been there or thereabouts, but never the [quickest] car.

“We need to keep working as a team. I need to keep working on my own stuff. And just try and put it together because there are still so many positives.

“There are so many good things and so many things in place. Frustrating when, you know, a few times this season we’ve thrown away something that should have been ours.”