{"id":22400,"date":"2025-07-25T09:14:07","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T09:14:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/22400\/"},"modified":"2025-07-25T09:14:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T09:14:07","slug":"lando-norris-braced-for-difficult-decisions-with-wet-belgian-grand-prix-sprint-weekend-on-the-horizon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/22400\/","title":{"rendered":"Lando Norris braced for ‘difficult decisions’ with wet Belgian Grand Prix Sprint weekend on the horizon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lando Norris believes teams will face \u201cdifficult decisions\u201d at Spa-Francorchamps, with wet weather expected across the Sprint weekend.<\/p>\n

The Belgian Grand Prix<\/a> often sees rain fall on at least one day, adding to the challenge of the iconic track, but the forecast for the coming weekend<\/a> suggests a 60% chance of precipitation on both Friday and Sunday, with a significantly lower chance on Saturday.<\/p>\n

With cars entering parc ferm\u00e9 conditions following Sprint Qualifying on Friday, and again following Qualifying on Saturday, this means teams could be forced to gamble between a dry and wet setup on both occasions \u2013 risking a weaker qualifying position in known conditions, for a potentially better race result in unknown weather the following day.<\/p>\n

Norris has enjoyed the strongest return of any driver this term in mixed conditions, with his win last time out in Silverstone<\/a> the latest example of his prowess.<\/p>\n

Asked ahead of the weekend how much focus goes on the Sprint compared to the Grand Prix, Norris said: \u201cIt could be tricky now because of the rain, so I think you might have to make some more difficult decisions in terms of tyres and things like that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s always a lot more points on Sunday, so I think most of the focus is always there, but if you\u2019re one position higher or lower in the Sprint race, it\u2019s not the end of the world. You\u2019ll always take a bit less risk there, but Sunday is the main day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reflecting on his success in wet conditions this year, he added: \u201cTo be honest, it\u2019s not always the wet. I feel I\u2019m always good in intermediate conditions, when it\u2019s wet to dry or dry to wet.<\/p>\n

“The full wet conditions are quite different, but I\u2019ve had good moments here in the wet. Even when I had my crash a few years ago in Q3, I was still P1 in Q1, P1 in Q2, and then P1 in the wall.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m British, and maybe that helps. I\u2019ve had very good races this year in the wet, that\u2019s true. But all the qualifyings have been in the dry when it\u2019s been that scenario, so it\u2019s tough. There isn\u2019t an easy answer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI enjoy these conditions still. Maybe never the most fun because it can be quite scary at times, but Spa in the wet is normal, so I\u2019m ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

McLaren has battled multiple contenders at the front of the field this season, with Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari shining in different conditions and on different layouts. Given the uncertainty surrounding the coming weekend, championship leader Oscar Piastri struggled to point to which team he expects will provide the greatest challenge this time out.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt could be all of them,\u201d said Piastri. \u201cFerrari in Silverstone were very strong. I think the race didn\u2019t go to plan for them, but their pace across the whole of the weekend was very strong.<\/p>\n

“Red Bull and Max have been very strong here in the past, and Mercedes, when it\u2019s cold and the right conditions, they did have a one-two for about an hour last year, so it\u2019s a track where they have been quick before.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a track where our competition is going to be strong across the board, and we need to try and focus on ourselves and maximise what we have.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lando Norris believes teams will face \u201cdifficult decisions\u201d at Spa-Francorchamps, with wet weather expected across the Sprint weekend.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22401,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1687,372,6537,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-22400","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-formula1","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22400\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}