McLaren hand F1 rivals warning over hidden Lando Norris potential

McLaren CEO Zak Brown believes Lando Norris was "much quicker than we looked" in United States Grand Prix practice - after making a mistake.

Norris only placed seventh in the second practice session at Austin, and was 1.082s slower than pace-setter Charles Leclerc, with Liam Lawson even squeaking ahead in the Racing Bulls machine into sixth place.

However, on his best lap time, Norris made a mistake in the final sector of the lap, ruining his strong pace in the first two, which could have led to a more representative lap time ahead of final practice and qualifying.

Reflecting on the performance, Brown explained that had Norris been able to execute a perfect lap, the MCL40 would have been "there or thereabouts."

"I think Lando is definitely a lot quicker than his lap time [suggests]," Brown told Sky Sports F1.

"He didn't get his third sector in, and his first two sectors were very strong, so I think we are much quicker than we looked.

"I think Ferrari's lap time, Mercedes' lap time, we're there or thereabouts."

The team's chief technical officer and chief designer, Rob Marshall, then added that the team had reason to feel optimistic.

"We set a purple [sector] in FP2 as well, but just didn't finish the lap," said Marshall.

"It was a competitive lap up until the point where we made a mistake. 

"I think it's going forward from here, and we've got to be quite optimistic, really."

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McLaren upgrades verdict

Then turning to the upgrades McLaren had delivered to Austin, Marshall explained that whilst the parts had worked, they were not intended to be raced.

"We're very pleased, actually," he said.

"We bought a few... I wouldn't say as a tiny upgrade, but it's really small parts that are kind of almost a bit of tuning really. But they seem to deliver quite well, so there is certainly a measurable benefit.

"We see it in the stopwatch as well, so we're quite pleased. 

"They were kind of test. They were test items which we never really planned to race. But there was a secondary part of that brake stuff that was really an aerodynamic gain and conditioning around the wheels and weight control, that sort of stuff. So we think that's delivered for us."