Brown addresses Norris 'weakness' ahead of Verstappen battle

McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown has said it is key for Lando Norris to not "overthink" his race starts, with the British driver starting the Dutch Grand Prix from pole.

The American believes talking too much about what is starting to be perceived as a weakness - something the 24-year-old himself has called it - risks making an issue out of it.

Norris has started first five times in his F1 career, across both sprints and grand prix, and has so far failed to have led the first lap on any of those occasions.

The one-time grand prix winner will start the race at Zandvoort with Max Verstappen alongside him, but the short run down to Turn 1 provides Norris an opportunity to vanquish that streak.

Meanwhile, Brown has said his driver needs to approach the situation with a "go out and do your thing" attitude.

"I think don't overthink it," the 52-year-old told Sky Sports F1 when asked about how the team and Norris had been working to instil a positive psychology around race starts.

"At the end of the day, clearly all these drivers have immense natural talent, and so just don't overthink it.

"Go out and do your thing. I think if you talk about it too much then you make..."

"An issue of it," Naomi Schiff interrupted, to which Brown agreed before continuing: "So yeah, not worried about that.

"Max [Verstappen] is going to be tough. He likes to get his elbows out, as does everyone in Formula 1. So let's see what happens tomorrow."

Norris is known to be an analytical and introspective character, and is often considered to be overly self-critical.

The Briton is open about his mistakes at the wheel of his McLaren and addresses his errors with the media more receptively than other drivers.

Brown was keen to see if Norris would find anything to fault about his Zandvoort pole effort, which was over three-tenths of a second faster than Verstappen behind.

"It will be interesting to see if he thinks he made any mistakes that lap, because I didn't see any," he said. "He is very honest with everyone. He's sometimes too hard on himself.

"It's pretty awesome [Norris' performances], and the smallest mistake, he can be a bit tough on himself, but judging by the smile on his face coming out of the car, he's going to be in a good place and raring to go."