{"id":644609,"date":"2026-05-02T09:22:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-02T09:22:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/644609\/"},"modified":"2026-05-02T09:22:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T09:22:14","slug":"f1-2026-rivals-telling-comment-about-mclaren-as-move-pays-off-for-oscar-piastri-and-lando-norris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/644609\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 2026: Rival’s telling comment about McLaren as move pays off for Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris"},"content":{"rendered":"

McLaren will be thrilled with Oscar Piastri<\/a> and Lando Norris after starting strongly after a five-week break with the reigning F1<\/a> champion starting at pole for the sprint. McLaren used their five-week break between GPs to upgrade their cars in a bid to catch Mercedes and Ferrari in Miami.<\/p>\n

And it appears to have paid off with Norris finishing pole for the sprint ahead of Kimi Antonelli. Piastri finished in third. Norris was pleased with his efforts after McLaren used the time to improve their car.<\/p>\n

\"McLaren<\/p>\n

McLaren would be thrilled with Oscar Piastri (pictured right) and Lando Norris\u2019 start. (Getty Images)<\/p>\n

(Getty Images)<\/p>\n

And he put it down to the team with the new upgrades working as planned with the English star becoming the first driver to out qualify Mercedes this season. \u201cPerfect result for us,\u201d Norris said. \u201cNice way to reward the team. \u201cWe\u2019ve got a lot of new upgrades on the car, so it was nice to feel some grip again.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd a nice reward for the guys and girls who\u2019ve put a lot of work into this. I\u2019ve always loved Miami on and off the track. It\u2019s the beginning of the weekend, so still a long way to go but nice to tick things off by doing this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Lando<\/p>\n

Lando Norris (pictured) was the fastest driver and qualified in pole for the sprint. (Photo by Kym Illman\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

(Kym Illman via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Piastri admitted there was plenty to come from the car across the weekend and he was looking forward to the improvements. \u201cI\u2019m happy with that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe car had good potential, which was really nice to see. We still have things to improve, but the new package is a good step, so thank you to the whole team for their efforts. Congratulations to Lando as well, we didn\u2019t luck into today\u2019s result, the potential is there.\u201d<\/p>\n

George Russell praises McLaren improvements<\/p>\n

While Piastri and Norris were happy, George Russell couldn\u2019t believe the improvements coming from their rivals. The English driver is second in the drivers\u2019 championship, but finished sixth for the sprint.<\/p>\n

\u201cPretty surprising how big a jump McLaren and Ferrari made. That\u2019s pretty damn impressive,\u201d Russell said after the practice. \u201cWe knew they had probably closed the gap but all day they were quicker than us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Norris admitted it wasn\u2019t easy out there, but he managed to turn it around after Q2. \u201cIt was pretty tough,\u201d Norris said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy Q2 was pretty woeful. I was like one second off. Didn\u2019t fill me with confidence heading into the final round.\u201d McLaren sit third in the constructors\u2019 championship on 46 points. Mercedes lead on 135 ahead of Ferrari on 90.<\/p>\n

\"Oscar<\/p>\n

Oscar Piastri (pictured) feels there is plenty left in the car for the weekend. (Photo by Kym Illman\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

(Kym Illman via Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McLaren will be thrilled with Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris after starting strongly after a five-week break with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":644610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,826,813,816,3875,528,78378,1737,913,2333,85],"class_list":["post-644609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-ferrari","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-george-russell","tag-getty-images","tag-kym-illman","tag-lando-norris","tag-mclaren","tag-oscar-piastri","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}