Norris: 'They could easily be in front of us if everything comes together'

As well as an exciting title fight between Red Bull Racing and Mercedes, the battle for the last spot on the podium is also very exciting in 2021. McLaren and Ferrari barely outrun each other, although Lando Norris thinks Ferrari 'should easily be ahead of them'.

Norris has been one of the big standouts of 2021 so far. The young Briton has finished in the points in every race so far with eighth place being his worst result in Spain. He's also pipped teammate Daniel Ricciardo, who doesn't seem to have quite mastered the MCL35M yet. The points at Ferrari are much more fairly distributed: Charles Leclerc has 58 and Carlos Sainz 50. In the constructors' standings, McLaren are only 12 points ahead of the Scuderia with 120 points.

Ferrari score fairly constant

"It's not like they're in trouble every race. Paul Ricard, in particular, was bad for them, but a lot of circuits suit Ferrari better than us," Norris said in a conversation with the Dutch branch of Motorsport.com. The Briton points out that Ferrari have one of the best cars in the corners and mainly lose time on the straights.

"So at the moment they are our biggest threat. We are still working very hard, therefore we are not taking anything for granted at the moment. We need to keep doing that and keep improving the car, because they could easily be in front of us once everything comes together," Norris admitted.

Ferrari on the way back

Ferrari are having a relatively good year after the problems the team had in 2020. Leclerc managed to score pole position twice for the team, but couldn't turn it into wins. Sainz has the only podium to his name so far at the Italian outfit.