McLaren have recently made a change to Lando Norris’ Formula 1 car which could explain his resurgence in the title race with Oscar Piastri.
Norris won just one race out of the first seven of the season, while Piastri had won four. The Briton was at a loss as to why his teammate was more consistent, but McLaren traced it back to a car-specific upgrade.
Changes made to their MCL39 at the Canadian Grand Prix to improve the steering feedback in Norris’ car were made, and since then, he’s been much closer to Piastri.
Discussing the changes on the Motorsport Magazin podcast, former Sauber F1 car designer Jorg Zander offered his theory on what McLaren might have done to help Norris.
Photo by Clive Rose/Getty ImagesMcLaren’s Lando Norris upgrade explained by Ex-Sauber F1 car designer
Norris improved his lap time by four tenths on Max Verstappen’s pole at the Austrian Grand Prix, which is an impressive feat considering he’s struggled in qualifying this year.
The upgrade has enabled Norris to exploit one Fernando Alonso trait in his driving, where he feels the car through his hands on the steering wheel.
Zander explains why this specific upgrade has given better feedback for Norris and enabled McLaren to utilise more negative steering angles to increase tyre grip.
“I can tell you that in the past, I have never seen a Formula 1 car with a negative steering yaw, always positive. I know that a negative caster angle can offer advantages under certain circumstances,” said Zander.
“If you don’t have wishbones, but multi-link axles where you can create these imaginary joint centres, you can actually achieve very good negative steering angles.”
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Lando Norris improves key area he was losing to Oscar Piastri after car upgrade
Before the Canadian GP, Norris was trailing Piastri in one key area of the race weekend which was having a massive impact on his performances.
The Briton would often be ahead of Piastri in the first part of qualifying, with that also translating into the second part of the session (Q2).
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But once they reached Q3, it was Piastri who had the edge on the Briton. Norris has improved this stat since the car upgrades, but he still trails by a few races.
This will likely be an important stat moving forward, after Norris himself admitted that he needed to improve qualifying in his bid to retake the lead in the title race.