“Not unrealistic” for Norris to finish P3 in F1 championship - McLaren

A stunning start to the season has enabled Norris to occupy third place in the drivers’ standings after the opening 10 rounds of the campaign, with the Briton currently five points clear of Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas.

The 21-year-old has been one of the standout performers in 2021 and is the only driver to have scored points in every race so far this year. Norris has also finished on the podium three times during his remarkably consistent run.

"Whether it [third] is a realistic target is difficult to say because the Red Bull car and the Mercedes car is clearly a better car," Seidl said.

"Valtteri and Checo have also showed some great races this year and also from the past, what they can do. It is down to the strong performances by Lando together with the team and with the competitive car we have this year, we’ve managed after 10 races to be P3.

"So it is not unrealistic to stay there, let’s see what we can do in the second half of the season.

"But we have to be honest as well one or the other at times something needs to go wrong on the Red Bull side or Mercedes side as we are not in a position yet purely down to our performance to beat them.

"That is the reality we are in and we cannot forget that.”

McLaren also holds third place in the constructors’ championship but remains wary of the threat posed by main rival Ferrari, with the Italian outfit only 15 points behind heading into this weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix.

“To be honest I am not surprised by the performance of the Ferrari team, I am also not surprised by the steps they can make during the season,” Seidl added.

“They are a strong team with two strong drivers, they have all the resources also that you need in order to react to problems, they have the team with the experience to react to problems.

“So it’s not a surprise and it will be a very tense battle until the end of the season. We are bringing some upgrades to Hungary to our car to make sure we can keep this battle up.

“It’s great for us that we are P3 in the constructors’ championship. After 10 races, 163 points is a big step forward for us compared to last year so very happy with that.”