Norris stuck with slow McLaren engine as Stella admits fix must wait until Singapore
Photo: Race Pictures
Tim Kraaij is Editor-in-Chief of GPblog.com and a Formula 1 analyst. With permanent FIA accreditation and direct access to the paddock, he delivers in-depth, data-driven analysis and insight into key developments within the sport.
Lando Norris will race the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia with a straight-line speed deficit that McLaren cannot fix this weekend. Team principal Andrea Stella has said any further changes can only come at Singapore, and Norris has little room left in his power-unit allocation to replace the problem.
Norris was asked after qualifying whether McLaren had considered swapping the power unit that is costing him top speed. His reply was short: "I'm pretty sure I still need it."
The reigning champion qualified sixth with a 1:35.757, 0.627 seconds behind polesitter Max Verstappen and just 0.005 seconds ahead of teammate Oscar Piastri. He moves up to fifth on the grid because of Isack Hadjar's five-place penalty, which we covered in Bahrain GP starting grid heavily reshuffled in Sepang: Red Bull driver set for grid drop.
Norris has no spare parts left
Norris's answer makes sense once you look at his component count. Under the 2026 rules, each driver may use four internal combustion engines, three Energy Stores and three power-unit control electronics units across the season. Norris has already reached his limit for ICEs and Energy Stores and is over the limit for control electronics, as he is on his fourth unit.
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The fourth control electronics unit already cost him once. McLaren fitted it at Spa in July and took a 10-place grid penalty, choosing that circuit because overtaking is easier there. At the time the team said it planned to use the unit for the rest of the season.
Any new element would mean another grid drop. Going over the allocation for an element type costs 10 places the first time, and each further replacement of the same type costs five. If a driver's penalties add up to more than 15 places, he starts from the back.
Stella puts a number on the deficit
Speaking at Sepang, Stella said the problem shows up as lower top speed, not as a fault McLaren can point to. He told that in the power-limited sections Norris's car accelerates a little less, and estimated the loss at "probably between one and two kph".
It's small quantities that we see statistically and we should more precisely talk about the deficit of straightline speed. OK, which we can quantify in a laptime loss that I would say in excess of one tenth of a second, possibly between one and two tenths of a second.- Andrea Stella, McLaren team principal
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Norris lost most of that time in the second half of the lap. Piastri was faster on the run between Turns 13 and 14 and on the back straight towards Turn 15. Stella was careful not to blame engine supplier Mercedes. He said the cause could also be linked to the chassis or the drag of the car.
So it's at no point we are making a point about power unit. We are just making a point about a lack of straightline speed, which we want to make a point about because it's fair to Lando that we take the responsibility for the fact that on his car, there's a laptime deficit, which at the moment we have not been able to remove in a couple of events.- Andrea Stella, McLaren team principal
Baku problem carried over to Sepang
This is the second weekend in a row the issue has come up. At last week's race in Baku, Stella told that the team saw a power deficit on Norris's car that appeared to be linked to fuel injection behaviour. In Baku, George Russell was 11.5 km/h faster than Norris through the speed trap.
McLaren still does not know what is causing the problem, so Norris will have to live with it on Sunday. Stella said the team will keep looking at every possible factor: "we will look at further changes, but we only can do that now for Singapore."
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Norris himself was blunt about how the deficit shows on track. "I'm just down on every single straight, so every time I get a good exit, I'm just slower at the end of the straight," he said after Qualifying.
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