The Briton acknowledged there were “certain things” he could have done better in Belgium, but insisted “nothing which means I could have won the race”.<\/p>\n
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Norris said: “I don’t feel like I did a bad job. I didn’t have the best run but at the same time we had some, not problems, some incorrect settings with the battery. Which meant he had a slight advantage of battery compared to me, which certainly didn’t help. But I also didn’t do the best (first) two corners.<\/p>\n
“Whether that would have made a difference or not, hard to say. With the issue, he probably would have passed me no matter what. So yeah, a tougher one to take from that perspective.”<\/p>\n
Norris also pointed to a slow pit stop and a lock-up in Turn One while he was trying to chase Piastri down and which cost him a total of four seconds of race time when he lost by less than that.<\/p>\n
Norris has acknowledged already this season that he made too many mistakes in qualifying in the early part of the season, when Piastri went on a run of four wins in five races.<\/p>\n
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And he said he had adjusted his approach from always pushing to the limit to give himself a little more margin for error.<\/p>\n
“Sometimes this year, even 95% would have been fine,” Norris said.<\/p>\n
“These are some of my mistakes from earlier on in the season. I mean, I tried before at 101%. Sometimes that’s amazing. Sometimes that’s, I think, as good as you can get.<\/p>\n
“I do believe that. But also at times I should drive at 95% or even 90% and that’s not enough to be on pole or P2 sometimes.<\/p>\n
“So yeah, I regret trying to… I mean, I do regret trying to be so good at the beginning part of the season. And I think now already I sometimes settle for a 95% lap and that’s still good enough.”<\/p>\n
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Piastri said: “I have a lot of confidence in myself that I can do it. Not every weekend has been perfect, but there’s not many weekends in my whole life that have been perfect.<\/p>\n
“Just trying to put together a solid, consistent year is ultimately going to be important.<\/p>\n
“The pace in the last few weekends, especially Spa, I’ve been very confident in and very proud of.<\/p>\n
“I’m more than capable of continuing that for the rest of the year. I’m confident that I can do it, but it’s not going to be easy.”<\/p>\n
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen is 81 points behind Piastri – more than three clear wins. And Norris said that while it was “never impossible”, the Dutchman was “quite a long way back”.<\/p>\n
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He added: Max is still quite easily one of the best drivers ever in Formula 1. So as a driver, I wouldn’t rule him out.<\/p>\n
“But we have a better car, we have a better team. So I have my confidence in them that we can stay ahead.”<\/p>\n
Mercedes driver George Russell said: “Oscar’s been very solid. I think he gets the most out of himself every single weekend, is my takeaway, he’s very consistent, doesn’t get flustered, and just delivers reliably.<\/p>\n
“Whereas I feel Lando’s got huge raw speed, but probably the hit rate isn’t as high as Oscar’s.<\/p>\n
“But they’re two incredible drivers, and I think they’ll continue fighting for quite a while. But Oscar doesn’t seem very phased.”<\/p>\n
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Russell also pointed to a penalty Piastri received for braking behind the safety car at the British Grand Prix, which cost him the win to Norris.<\/p>\n
“It swings so quickly, doesn’t it? The momentum shifts so quickly,” Russell said. “But I think Oscar was a bit unfortunate in Silverstone. He could have also won the race in Austria, it could have gone very differently.<\/p>\n
“Lando, over the last three years, has beaten Oscar over that period, so you can’t count out either of them, but I think it’s definitely fair to say Oscar’s sort of stepped up this year.”<\/p>\n
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