‘Demanding’ Lando Norris will push McLaren for more strategy risks

Lando Norris says he will push McLaren to take more strategy risks after suffering a narrow defeat to Max Verstappen at the F1 Japanese Grand Prix.

After being pipped to pole position by Verstappen in qualifying, Norris followed the Red Bull driver for all 53 laps of a processional grand prix at Suzuka.

The leaders both pitted on the same lap and re-emerged in the same positions, with Verstappen just ahead after Norris ran out of road and took to the grass as they exited the pit lane almost side-by-side.

McLaren’s strategy came under scrutiny for the team’s decision not to try and undercut Verstappen, and Norris would like to see his side adopt a more attacking mindset.

"Would I be willing to take that risk of boxing behind more cars and going for the win then? Yes,” said Norris, who leads the championship by one point from Verstappen heading into this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix.

"But we still finished second and third. We still got more points in the constructors', and I still had a good result as a driver for points, but I did lose out to Max and at the minute he's my main competitor. But there was a lot of reviews.

"We were not happy after last weekend. Second and third is a great result as a team, still. But could it have been better potentially, and could we have potentially taken more risks and have been a bit more attacking as a team? Yes.

"At the end of the day I stand by our approach with that weekend, but [after] a review into these weekends, [we need] to be a bit more attacking at times.”

Norris added: "I think, at times, I might want to take more risk to go for a win. It's not always a guarantee.

"There might be cases where we go for it, I get stuck or Oscar undercuts me, or another driver undercuts me, or overcuts and the price of taking a risk doesn't come out in my favour and, actually, I lose positions in the end of the day.

"I need to acknowledge that could be the case sometimes. I want to accept second is a not a bad result, but I need to win races and not settle for second.

Lando Norris ready to be more demanding

Norris admitted he may have be become “more demanding” from within the cockpit of his McLaren, despite acknowledging that his team “has the best picture of the whole race”.

"Definitely, from my side, I would love to go and kind of go back and redo things with a slightly more aggressive approach, but I do know deep down that it's a long season, and sometimes points on the board is better than taking unnecessary risks,” he continued.

“I also always know that the team has the best picture of the whole race, better than any other driver. I also have the best feeling of the car, the size, how overtaking might be, that kind of thing. You just need harmony between you and your race engineer and strategy team.”

“It might be that I need to potentially be more demanding at times and more pushing of the team, but it’s just getting the dynamic right at the end of the day between that risk-reward factor and knowing how much risk you want to take on the day and how aggressive you want to be.”