Andrea Stella proud of Norris after ‘best qualifying of the year’

SPIELBERG: McLaren team boss Andrea Stella said he was proud of Lando Norris’s performance after the Briton took a dominant pole position in Austria in what he called his best qualifying of the year.

Norris led every phase, going fastest in Friday and Saturday practice, a decisive response to a poor qualifying in Canada and his collision with championship-leading teammate Oscar Piastri in that race two weeks ago.

Read more: Norris savours finding ‘the old me’ in taking pole at Austrian GP

That incident, which he accepted blame for, left Norris 22 points behind Piastri.

“Even in Canada, after reviewing the weekend with Lando and his engineers, we always said the speed was there,” Andrea Stella told Sky Sports television.

“When he had the little contact with the wall in qualifying, he was on track for a pole position. And in the race, he was one of the fastest, if not the fastest car. The speed was always there. We needed to polish the execution.

“I’m really proud of Lando today. Not only he scored a pole position, but it’s a dominant pole position, a pretty remarkable lap time.”

Norris was more than half a second faster than his closest rival, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, on the shortest lap of the season.

The Briton said the upgraded car felt strong and quick.

Qualifying, a strong point last year, has become more of a problem this season, but Norris seemed to have rectified some of the issues.

“It was easily my best qualifying of the year from a delivery point of view from every single lap I did. I still made a couple of mistakes here and there, but none that cost me a lap or anything,” he said.

“I think on deliveries, consistency and of course putting it in when it counts in Q3 (it) was easily the best lap I’ve done for this whole season, probably even better than Monaco, honestly.

“Maybe not as exciting a lap as Monaco, but definitely a better put-together lap than I did there.”

Norris won from pole in Monaco, with the fastest lap, as he did in the Australian season-opener.

Read more: Norris leads McLaren practice one-two after Dunne shines

“It shows that the feelings I’ve been requiring, the feelings that I’ve not been getting as easily, when they are more my way and more where I want them to be, I can put in better performances and have days like today,” he said.