McLaren think "Mercedes will be a step ahead" in the remainder of the Spielberg weekend

McLaren emerged from Friday's practice sessions at the Austrian Grand Prix feeling quietly optimistic after both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri demonstrated encouraging pace, despite an interrupted start to the weekend for Norris and the team deciding not to run an experimental front wing it had brought to the Red Bull Ring.

The opening practice session began in frustrating fashion for Norris, whose running was severely limited by a hydraulic leak that kept his MCL39 in the garage for most of FP1.

By the time the issue had been resolved, the Briton had only enough time to complete several installation laps on the medium compound tyres before switching to the soft C5s. However, a late red flag prevented him from completing a representative qualifying simulation, leaving him seventh fastest with a best lap of 1:08.873.

Fortunately for McLaren, the second practice session painted a much more encouraging picture. Norris quickly made up for his lost track time by setting the third-fastest lap of FP2 with a 1:07.339, while team-mate Oscar Piastri finished second with a 1:07.251, splitting the Mercedes drivers and confirming McLaren's strong one-lap pace.

Reflecting on his disrupted but ultimately productive Friday, Norris admitted that the team had recovered well after the early setback.

“An issue in Free Practice 1 put us on the back foot, but once that was resolved we started to make some progress as the sessions went on today. From a pace point of view, we’ve had a reasonable day, and we’re a bit closer to the cars ahead, which is encouraging.

“This track seems to suit us as we’ve seen in the last few years, and that’s a good trend for the weekend ahead. The priority now is to build a little more confidence in the car, and if we can do that, I think we can take another step forward to the leading teams. There’s work to do, but the signs are positive and we’ll keep pushing to turn that into a stronger position ahead of tomorrow’s Qualifying.”

Piastri enjoyed a much smoother day than his team-mate, completing a clean programme in both sessions and finishing third in FP1 before improving to second later in the afternoon.

Although Mercedes appeared to hold a slight advantage over the field, the Australian was pleased with the progress McLaren made as it continued evaluating setup options first explored at the previous race in Spain.

“We had a pretty good day finishing well in both sessions. We knew Mercedes would be a step ahead, and that’s how it played out, but it was productive for us.

"We worked through a lot of setup items and got through some homework carried over from Spain. We did a good job trialling different approaches and understanding the car better.

“Looking ahead to tomorrow, there are definitely areas where we can learn overnight to help close the gap, but I am feeling more comfortable, and I’m happy with how today has gone. We’ll focus on incremental gains and see where that gets us.”

Although McLaren left Friday with both drivers inside the top three in FP2, the team remains cautious. Previous race weekends have seen its competitive practice pace fade slightly in qualifying, and avoiding a repeat of that scenario will be a major objective overnight.

Technical Director of Applied Engineering Neil Houldey was satisfied with the team's progress but emphasised that there is still performance to unlock from the current package.

“We're reasonably pleased with our progress today, although we know there's more performance to find in the car. Lando did an excellent job to get up to speed so quickly in FP2 after the hydraulic issue cost him most of the first session, which was very encouraging to see.

"While we feel we have opportunities to improve overnight, we are under no illusions about the level of competition. We expect it to be incredibly tight at the front.”

Houldey also revealed that McLaren had intended to evaluate an experimental wing during Friday's running but ultimately decided against using the new component after final inspections uncovered concerns before it ever reached the circuit.

“Unfortunately, we were unable to run the experimental wing we brought to the track. The team at the factory worked tirelessly to get it here, but during final sign-off tests in the garage, it didn't perform as expected, and we weren't comfortable running it.

"The correct decision was to focus our track time on optimising the current package for this weekend. It’s disappointing, but we will conduct more work on the component before bringing it to a future event.”