Lando Norris airs 'knife-edge' McLaren gripe in 'mentally draining' challenge

Lando Norris has described the "mentally draining" challenge of trying to extract performance from his McLaren F1 car, which he says feels "on a knife-edge" in corners.

Norris finished in fourth place in the Singapore Grand Prix, scoring his best result of the recent triple-header of races, after also suffering a DNF in Azerbaijan, a ninth in Bahrain and eighth in the Singapore Sprint. 

McLaren's lead over Red Bull in the constructors' championship in the battle for third place has almost evaporated as it now stands at just seven points. It was 76 following the Spanish GP and a mini-purple patch of races for Norris.

Across the Hungarian, Dutch, Italian, and Spanish races either side of the summer break, Norris claimed three pole positions and two victories, in Budapest and Zandvoort, before an unfortunately timed VSC denied him in Madrid.

Hungary was McLaren's last big upgrade to the MCL40, which has struggled all season with short gear ratios and being too draggy, despite Norris' two wins.

Detailing the experience of driving a car with which he is defending his world championship, Norris explained how he was having to "force" it to do what he wanted and that it was a "mentally draining" experience.

"It's just on a knife edge on every single corner," Norris described the MCL40 to media, including RacingNews365. 

"You've got to drive it within an exact per cent, and you have to force the car in every single way. You can't let the car do any work. 

"You can't just let the front do the work or the rear do the work. You have to force the front. You've got to force the rear. You've got to drive it in a way that takes so much concentration and so much ability.

"It's just full-on and mentally draining because of how hard you have to work behind the wheel. 

"So it's just too difficult, and it makes it impossible to put laps together in qualifying, which just shows how good of a job you know we were able to do when we were getting on pole and things like that, and how rewarding that felt.

"But with it not being quick enough now, it's just too difficult."

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Norris - 'No magical' moments

With the car struggling over the Baku, Sepang, and Singapore weekends, Norris felt that he was now unable to deliver any "magical" moments, such as his Madrid pole when he denied Kimi Antonelli by just 0.011s to P1.

"You can't do anything magical because we're simply not quick enough," he added.

"You have to force the car, and not let it do any work because it doesn't do it on its own, and that's not what you want from a car at all."