Lando Norris: Progress is being made, but more needs to be added

McLaren’s best result in second practice in Baku was Lando Norris’ tenth fastest time. His teammate Daniel Ricciardo showed the fourteenth result. The team is not hiding that they are waiting for an uphill battle to reach Saturday’s qualifying final.

Lando Norris (10th): “Tough day due to very difficult track conditions. I believe we made some progress with the car, but the wind made it difficult to work.

In both sessions it was difficult to understand everything because the wind did not provide enough stability in passing circles, but all under equal conditions. I think we’ve made progress, but we need to add more. In the evening there is a lot of work on the analysis of the collected information in order to be able to take a few steps forward tomorrow.”

Daniel Riccardo (14th): “Not an easy day. In the morning we experimented, which left us behind at the end of the session. However, we had reasons to do this work, after which we adjusted the settings, which allowed us to reach a more competitive level in the second session.

In the evening I will have to think about how I can adjust the settings a bit, and I have to add that myself to be able to drive a little better through some corners. At least in the second session I felt the car had potential, which gave me some reassurance. I think we can take another step forward tomorrow.”

Andrea Stella, race director: “We had two productive sessions in Baku. We had no problems with the cars and there were fewer stops due to the yellow and red flags specific to this track.

We ran the planned program, focusing on car settings, tire analysis for qualifying and the race, on the air resistance analysis – all these things are very important on this track.

As usual the fight in the middle group is very tight, but we will do our best to get the cars ready for qualifying and try to reach the final on Sunday and score points.”