Continuing the impressive start to his Formula 1 career, Lando Norris made it to Q3 for the second race in a row, qualifying tenth for the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix.
Norris was blocked severely during Q1 by a slow-moving Romain Grosjean and admitted to making small errors throughout qualifying. Despite this, Norris progressed to Q3, ultimately rounding out the top-ten with a lap time of 1:29.043.
“Overall I thought [qualifying] was pretty good,” said Norris. “My runs were okay in general although I made a couple of mistakes and don’t feel I did as good a job as in Australia.
“I know the track here more and it’s not as technical but it’s easier to make smaller mistakes. I had a little under-rotation into Turn 10, not even a lock-up, but lost a little time.”
Unlike his grand prix debut, Norris failed to out-qualify his team-mate Carlos Sainz Jr., the Spaniard lining up seventh on the grid with a lap-time of 1:28.813.
“It would have been nice to be alongside Carlos and it was close. I think he was only just over a tenth ahead, so I’m reasonably happy.”
For the race, Norris points to tyre strategy as being critical as he goes in search of his first points in Formula 1.
“It’s obviously going to be difficult from P10. I don’t think these tyres are too bad but the guys behind have more choice to start on, so we’ll just have to see how it goes!”
