Norris: There were too many difficulties today

Oscar Piastri’s McLaren debut ended with an early retirement, with Lando Norris finishing last, two laps behind the leader, as the team was plagued by technical problems on the day of the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Lando Norris (17th): “Very difficult race. We had some issues that needed to be resolved one way or another, and that actually knocked us out of contention for a normal result.

However, we tried to stay on track until the last minute – in case the safety car came or some other situation came up, which would give us a chance.

Without the problems we could show a good pace. But today there were too many difficulties that prevented us from fighting for points, so we will try to achieve this next time.

Oscar Pistri (retirement): “I’m disappointed that my race ended so quickly. I had a good start, had some good overtakes and everything was going well. I think until the moment the car had an electrical problem we were doing pretty well done.

The team is continuing to investigate this issue as we hoped replacing the steering wheel would solve the problem, but unfortunately that didn’t help.

Of course, this is not the end of the weekend I expected, but there are also positive moments, for example the car was able to set a good pace in the race distance. I was able to learn a lot and I am happy that my debut has taken place, so now I will prepare for the podium in Saudi Arabia in the hope that it will turn out better.

Andrew Stella, Team boss: “Not the start of the season we were hoping for. Definitely, today there was an opportunity to fight for points, our pace was at a competitive level, first and foremost that opportunity was in the case of Lando.

Unfortunately, technology let us down: Oscar had to retire due to an electrical issue that we are currently investigating. Lando’s car had air leaking from the power plant’s pneumatic system, so every ten laps we had to make a pit stop, pumping air into the system.

We leave Bahrain knowing that there is a lot of work ahead, but the season is long, we will be able to rebuild and in Saudi Arabia we will be ready to fight again.”