Lando Norris: It was very difficult to overtake

Of the McLaren drivers at Monza, only Lando Norris earned points, although Oscar Piastri also had such an opportunity, but due to an incident at the hands of Lewis Hamilton, the Australian’s car was damaged and he had to pit to to replace the nasal cup.

Lando Norris (8th): “It was a difficult race, although I can’t say it was very difficult to fight for the points today because we have a pretty fast car. Not as fast as the leaders, but compared to our direct rivals.

We were able to go faster than Alex Albon, but on the straights his Williams developed a very high speed and it was not possible to get ahead of him. But in general we performed well, and our problems mainly related to the degradation of rubber, which was very high.

Overtaking was very difficult, but when it wasn’t necessary the MCL60 could manage a good pace. However, Alex and the team at Williams deserve credit, they were fast all weekend and managed to stay ahead of us.

But we are happy with the result, because this is the maximum we were capable of. A big thank you to the team – and the race crew and everyone at the Woking base – for responding to the issues we encountered at Spa and being able to increase the speed of the car. But now we are starting to prepare for the Singapore Grand Prix, and here we need perseverance.

Oscar Pistri (12th): “A difficult day in which I had to overcome many difficulties. But you have to start with the fact that I was leading the Grand Prix for the first time, and it was great! Overall the pace of the car was encouraging, but unfortunately on the straights we still lacked the speed to really compete with Alex Albon.

After the first segment of difficulty got bigger, and because of the Lewis Hamilton incident, I lost the chance to earn points. There are many things that we need to analyze together with the team, but in Singapore we will fight with renewed vigor.”

Andrew Stella, Team boss: “Before this race we set ourselves the task of earning points with both cars, but we only partially achieved that. In Oscar’s case we were in the top ten, but then there was an incident with Lewis that put us out because we had to make another pit stop to replace the front wing on Piastri’s car.

Otherwise, we can be happy with the pace the MCL60 is capable of. We were prepared that the degree of rubber degradation would be even higher and that there would be more difficulties, but in reality the situation could be controlled and we were only held back by the inability to overtake.

Given the level we were at in Spa two races ago, this is reassuring. After the Belgian round, the team worked hard to solve the problem of the lack of top speed – the task was completed and new car parts were delivered to Monza until the last minute.

I want to thank everyone for their work, but now it’s time to prepare for Singapore. I hope we will be competitive there.”