McLaren lyrical about Verstappen: 'Are we still surprised he's doing this?'

F1 News

stella had no confidence in pole position and knew max would take pole
25 November 2023 at 19:35
4
  • Kada Sarkozi
  • Editor

The McLaren team will start tomorrow's race in Abu Dhabi from third and fifth place. Not ideal as Lando Norris seemed to be on his way to pole position until he powerslided in Turn 13. But was he really that close to pole? Team boss Andrea Stella gives details of the Briton's session to GPBlog and others.

''Based on the GPS data we see that Verstappen was still ahead of Lando. So realistically that would’ve been close to pole position but very likely not sufficient.'' said Stella. The Italian, unlike Helmut Marko, did expect Verstappen to put the car on pole: ''Are we still surprised, that he can do these kinds of things? I’m not. You know, Verstappen, Red Bull. For me it’s just hats off. Not much about the speed but about the consistency that they’ve been able to deliver. To me that’s the real element.'' He continued:''Here, the pole position is by a decent amount but sometimes it was much closer. Just the consistency. Stay out of trouble, deliver according to your potential. I think they are setting a very high bar.''

Norris and Piastri fusion

When asked if the best of Lando and Oscar Piastri had beaten Max, Stella has to laugh: ''I didn’t think about it like that. Very close. I don’t want to pass the message that says: oh yeah, we could’ve easily been on pole position even with the best of two. I don’t think that’s fair.