Lando Norris is confident McLaren can use a grid penalty trick used by other drivers to rescue his Belgian Grand Prix weekend.
The reigning champion is to take a 10-place grid penalty at Spa after the team elected to fit a new fourth control electronics system to Norris's car to make use of the new reliability fixes Mercedes HPP has deployed.
In 2026, each driver is allowed to use three CE systems penalty-free, with the first instance of exceeding this allocation bringing a 10-place grid drop. Norris's MCL40, along with that of Oscar Piastri, are to be fitted with a new ICE engine at Spa, but this is within the allocation and does not incur a grid drop.
When drivers have had to take grid penalties for new engine components, Spa has been the traditional circuit to do this, owing to the ample overtaking opportunities around the 7km lap as opposed to circuits such as the tight and twisty Hungaroring or, in recent years, Zandvoort.
It is a decision Norris hopes will still lead to a successful weekend, although he did express some concern about the viability of overtaking.
"We will have to wait and see how the overtaking is," Norris began to media, including RacingNews365, when asked if he could minimise the damage, as others have usually done at Spa.
"Most people would deploy basically the whole battery to Turn 5 (Les Combes), and you would go from pretty much 100% battery to zero, so there is not much use for the battery, so we have to wait and see.
"We probably have a small straight-line speed advantage compared to the people a little further back, so we should have a good chance, but just to overtake in general, I think it could be pretty difficult here.
"But the slipstream is pretty big, and there are still a few straights where there is no straight mode, and therefore the slipstream is pretty large, and you can gain a good amount for that.
"So I don't have all the answers yet, but we know it is better than Zandvoort and better than Hungary to take penalties, so I hope it is not the end of my weekend before it starts, but I am confident we can have a good weekend.
"We will wait and see."
Also interesting:
Join RacingNews365's Nick Golding and Samuel Coop as they look ahead to this weekend's Belgian Grand Prix! The significance of Spa-Francorchamps for Ferrari in regard to its title chances is a lead talking point, as is Red Bull's rear wing.
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