‘It’s just not good enough’: Norris hits out after Monaco DNF
Lando Norris fears grid penalties after a Mercedes power unit failure in Monaco.
Lando Norris fears grid penalties later in the season after a power unit failure ended his Monaco Grand Prix, with the McLaren driver warning that reliability issues could soon force him into engine-related penalties.
With Norris already cycling through power unit parts, too, he called on McLaren and Mercedes for a solution and to “do a better job”, adding “it’s just not good enough.”
Lando Norris fears future grid penalties after Monaco GP power unit failure
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The reigning world champion slowed midway through the race and had to park his McLaren in the pit lane, admitting his power unit “completely went”.
After a DNS was registered at the Chinese Grand Prix earlier in the year through an electrical issue, a gearbox issue put paid to Norris’ hopes at the Canadian Grand Prix last time out, with this power unit issue making it back-to-back retirements for the McLaren driver.
Given the tight constraints on power unit parts throughout the course of a season, Norris is now expecting to have to go beyond his allocation and take grid penalties later in the year as a result.
With that, the Briton elaborated on the issues he faced around Monte Carlo, and has called on his team and Mercedes to find a solution.
“There were some issues at the beginning, and then more in the middle, and I don’t know if they’re related or not, but I just got told to retire the car, so not a lot I can do nowadays,” Norris explained to PlanetF1.com and others after taking to the media pen.
“It was just a lot of stuff, like I could hear from the engine, the turbo, the battery, a lot of things that don’t sound correct.
“We tried to fix it, it made the problem worse. We put it back, so I had the problems again, but seemed to have to live with it, and then in the end they just completely went.
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“Problem is I’m on my third power unit already, third battery, and I’m taking penalties from this one onward. So hopefully that’s not the case, but I don’t know what to expect nowadays.
“It seems like every weekend we have something, but it’s not just McLaren, it’s Mercedes as well – and between HPP [Mercedes High Performance Powertrains] and McLaren, we have to do a better job, because it’s just not good enough.”
Additional reporting by Thomas Maher
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