Norris makes pledge to McLaren: 'I'll step it up next weekend'

In the opening laps Norris was slapped with a 5 second time penalty for being out of position at the start. "I didn't think I was that far forward I guess," the Briton says during the grid interviews after the race.

"A tough race of course. I made too many mistakes with the overtakes. The out of position was a messy race for me and disappointing not to bring home a 1-2 for my parents because that would have been lovely at home. A tough one, but still a few positives," added Norris regarding his P3 result in Bahrain.

Throughout the race Norris was involved in a number of on-the-limit battles with Charles Leclerc, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. "It's good racing throughout so no complaints just had good fun, good overtakes, everyone [was] hard and on the limit as it should be," the Briton said.

Although he was within a shot of taking Russell's P2 at the end stages of the race, in the end his efforts fell short to give McLaren a 1-2, with teammate Oscar Piastri taking his second race win of the season.