The new ‘look’ McLaren
The first free practice session of the Hungarian Grand Prix saw Leonardo Fornaroli participate among the rookies, on track at the wheel of the McLaren after his previous experience in Barcelona. If in that case the Formula 2 champion had replaced Lando Norris, today the Piacenza native took Oscar Piastri’s place, in a session where the Woking team presented itself with the new floor and the inverted movable wing.
Read more Verstappen disappointed: “It was difficult to find a good car balance”
Rolling up sleeves despite 3rd place
On track with all the new features in both sessions, Norris went from 11th place in FP1 to 3rd in FP2, effectively becoming the ‘leader’ of the standings behind Hamilton’s and Leclerc’s Ferraris: “A difficult day, not the two simplest sessions for us – commented the reigning champion – even if we made a step forward this afternoon, we still have work to do. Today we introduced some new features on the car and we need to understand them better and find a way to optimize them. We know that we won’t be able to catch our opponents immediately, so we must continue to work hard, but we are making steps in the right direction in some areas. We will work hard all night to get the most out of this package and we will see what we can do tomorrow”.
Read more Antonelli: “With this gap, pole position won’t be easy, but we’re better in race pace”
The session to recover
Absent in FP1, Piastri instead completed a different testing program from that of his teammate. The Australian, in fact, carried out his FP2 with the previous configuration of the single-seater, and therefore without the new features brought to the Hungaroring by McLaren. A decision taken by the team in order to make a comparison between the two cars, with Piastri’s test ending in eighth position: “It was a very challenging session for us. Track conditions were difficult due to strong winds, and the newer sections of the circuit are quite worn with very low grip, which made it difficult to find rhythm. Having only run for one session today, it took me a bit longer to get into FP2, but I thank Leo for his support this morning. We collected as much data as possible given the circumstances and will work tonight and in FP3 tomorrow to find improvements. The new components seem to be working as expected on Lando’s car, and I can’t wait to try them on mine tomorrow. The Ferraris look strong, but we feel we are in contention. If we can put all the pieces together and have a clean qualifying, we believe there is a good opportunity to make a lot of progress and be in the fight for a great result”.
