McLaren driver Lando Norris has lifted the lid on his struggles with the team's MCL60 this season. McLaren had openly admitted during pre-season testing that the MCL60 was not performing as they would have liked and both Norris and teammate Oscar Piastri struggled even to finish in the lower points positions during the first eight races of the season. However, a raft of mid-season updates transformed the MCL60's competitiveness, allowing Norris to take back-to-back second-place finishes in Britain and Hungary and the Briton has since risen to a creditable eighth position in the Drivers' Championship. Despite McLaren's dramatic upturn in form, Norris indicated his continued displeasure with the MCL60's characteristics, adding that he had been forced to deviate from his preferred driving style. "I don't like to drive the car the way that I have to drive it now. I feel like it isn't to my strengths at all," Norris told media, including RacingNews365.com . "I want to be able to carry minimum speed and [drive in a] 'U' [when negotiating] a corner, and the last thing I can do in the world now is 'U' a corner. I have to 'V' the corner more than ever. "I've never been the biggest fan of doing that, and I don't like it that much."
MCL60 "far away" from Norris' ideal car
"Basically, the car only likes to go in a straight line. It doesn't even go very quick in a straight line either, but we're very good in straight-line braking, which is why we were so quick in the wet at times," added Norris. "I wouldn't say we're quick in the wet as a general note, but we're quicker in the wet when braking is a big key, like in Monaco. "There's certain things which allow us to be competitive, but it's just to be able to have scope to do different lines and drive in different ways. "If the wind changes, if conditions changes, different fuel loads, tire degradation, we still always have to drive in one specific way, and it's not a way that I currently like, it's one that I've had to adapt to. "I still have to adapt a lot as a driver, and far away from the car that I want to be able to drive."
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