The McLaren drivers in Bahrain performed worse than expected, attributing such results to problems with the car, and admitting that it would not be easy to solve them.
Lando Norris (15th): “The mood is not good, but nothing can be done, now we are in such a situation, and we will have to get used to it. Of course, following several previous seasons, both the team and its fans had high expectations, but we have to admit that we are much inferior to our rivals.
McLaren engineers are now busy looking for some solutions, but this does not mean that everything will be fine next week. Let’s hope things get better next month. I still believe that on some routes everything will not be so bad. As soon as we understand the cause of the problems, it will be possible to eliminate them quickly enough by installing some technical innovations on the machine.
The MCL36 noticeably lacks downforce, handling is bad, new tires are hard to find the best approach to, and when there is not enough downforce, it is difficult to get the rubber to work effectively. There is understeer, then oversteer, and it is necessary that both the front and rear wheels hold the track better. In words, everything is simple, but it will be quite difficult to solve these problems.”
Daniel Riccardo (14): “The machine is definitely a big problem, and we have a lot to figure out. The race was hard, but I was ready for it. It is a pity that even its beginning turned out to be so unsuccessful. I remember that on the first lap around the 6th and 7th turns I saw some smoke ahead, following which I noticed that Lando had shifted to the left and cut off along the side of the road.
Instinct told me that I should follow his example, because I thought that ahead, perhaps in the middle of the track, some kind of car turned around. By the way, I still don’t know if that car was there or not. But I also remember that at that moment, when I also shifted to the side, several rivals drove past me. In general, I lost my position, following which the race was not easy.
But there were also positive moments: the car coped well with some turns, braked normally, but, of course, this is only compared to the teams of the second half of the peloton. Probably, we should not be compared with the leaders. It is clear that we are not in the positions we want to be, so we need to make improvements as soon as possible.”
