Lando Norris failed to finish Belgian GP after an engine issue on the final lap
Sunday 1 September 2019 19:33, UK
Lando Norris was left reflecting on what might have been after being denied his best race finish due to a final-lap engine failure at the Belgian Grand Prix.
Norris classified as 11th at the end of the race and was awarded the Driver of the Day despite being prevented from claiming a deserved P5 finish as reliability issues resurfaced.
Charles Leclerc just held off Lewis Hamilton to win from pole position to secure the first victory of his Formula 1 career, while Valtteri Bottas and Sebastian Vettel finished in third and fourth respectively.
Norris, 19, never threatened the front four, but was also a long way ahead of the chasing pack, and when asked if it was the unluckiest outcome he had experienced in racing, he told Sky Sports: "Yes, I would say so.
"I was on for my best result, and as a team it was our joint best result, from what Carlos has achieved, so things were looking so good. Things were looking up as for a while I haven't had a great result for myself.
"Whatever was giving me power, stopped giving me power. That's the simple way of putting it."
Norris was well placed for his best result in Formula One, beating sixth-placed finishes in Bahrain and Austria, and the 10 points in finishing fifth would have moved him up to eighth position in the drivers' standings.
But McLaren will head to Monza off the back of collecting no points in Belgium after Carlos Sainz's early retirement.
Norris overtook six cars on Turn 1 as he reaped the rewards from work on his opening-lap approach over the summer break.
He added: "I've been not so good on the first couple of laps let's say so far this year. That was one of the things over the summer break that I needed to improve on, my Turn 1, Turn 2 situations.
"I feel I did my homework, and it paid off. It led on to a very good race, but it was a bit lonely in the middle. I was just watching the big screens! I was watching TV while driving to see what was going on.
"There is a lot of positives. Although it was a plain sailing race for us, we still had to do the pit stops and still had to manage things, manage fuel and so on.
"I was getting a bit nervous when the Racing Points were just behind as they've had good pace all weekend. I expected to see my gap to him come down, but it was getting bigger.
"We just need to focus on why we were really bad on Friday in P1 and P2 and the changes we made, we need to look at how we transformed it in such a big way.
"We need to sit down, do our homework, and think how we can come back stronger at Monza, which is going to another tough track for us."
