Lando Norris spies 'good opportunity' to end Mercedes' F1 hot streak

Lando Norris has cast his mind to overthrowing Mercedes at the start of the Shanghai sprint race as he admitted the starting procedure is a “good opportunity” to beat the team.

Mercedes locked out the front row for Saturday's shorter race with George Russell slotting in ahead of team-mate Kimi Antonelli.

Reigning champion Norris was over half a second down on Russell's fastest time and will share the second row with Lewis Hamilton.

Having endured a challenging opening round in Australia, Norris voiced his satisfaction in outpacing Ferrari, considering Mercedes' pace was out of reach.

“I'm just happy with the result,” Norris said. “I'm not seeing what I lost, or gained, or whatever.

“P3 is as good as we can do for the time being. I'm pretty happy to beat both Ferraris, they seemed pretty good all day.

“I'm satisfied, it's a good position for tomorrow. Things have been better this weekend just because the track is a lot simpler from a power unit side of things.

“Everyone falls in line a bit more, we certainly seemed to get a good amount out of it at the end. It was a good lap, it puts me in a good position.”

Last time out in Melbourne, Mercedes suffered a slow getaway off the line as Russell fell behind Charles Leclerc, who soared to the lead from fourth on the grid.

Norris is eyeing up the opening lap as the best opportunity to streak ahead of Mercedes and cause a dent in its hot run of form.

“I don't expect them to get bad starts,” Norris said. “For years, they've been one of the best starters.

“It's an opportunity, for sure, they know what they did wrong last weekend in Melbourne.

“They'll probably be fine tomorrow, but you never know. It's a good opportunity, it's the easiest place to overtake, off the line.

“We'll see what we can do.”