Zak Brown Teases Improvement For McLaren Ahead Of Qualifying

Friday, 08 March 2024 at 14:00

McLaren CEO Zak Brown suggested his team should be more competitive in Jeddah than in Bahrain.

During the first race of the season at Bahrain International Circuit, the top five teams were almost equally matched in the qualifying session.

However, the real differences between them became apparent during the race. Lando Norris was fast during qualification and said he missed out on the front-row start because of a mistake.

But when the race began, it became clear that he probably wouldn't have been challenging for the podium either way. Even the 24-year-old said he didn't think the qualification would have made a difference in the end.

The McLaren drivers then crossed the finish line in P6 and P8- a great result compared to the beginning of last year, but not so great, considering the Papaya team was regularly on the podium at the end of 2023.

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Nevertheless, the British team came to Jeddah Corniche Circuit with higher hopes because the track in Bahrain apparently wasn't suitable for their car's characteristics.

That means McLaren is expected to perform better than its rivals on some other tracks. The team's chief executive, Zak Brown, told SkySports on Thursday ahead of the 2024 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

"I think we were a little bit more competitive (than we showed) in Bahrain, but we didn't quite get our qualifying laps together."

While Red Bull had an almost perfect weekend during the first race of the season, other teams like Mercedes and Ferrari also said they weren't able to get the most out of their cars due to various technical reasons.

Therefore, going into the second race of the season, it isn't clear at all how the pecking order will look. The CEO of McLaren added:

"Here, I feel like we're maybe a little bit closer to the front than we were in Bahrain. But I hope I don't eat my words now that I've made a little bit of a prediction."