Andreas Seidl says the result of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on Sunday showed a good recovery by the McLaren F1 Team, particularly after Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo ended lap one outside the top ten in twelfth and thirteenth place.
Norris fought back superbly to take a fifth-place finish to continue his unbroken run of top ten results in 2021, while Ricciardo also made gains to take ninth place at the Baku City Circuit.
McLaren fell behind Scuderia Ferrari in the Constructors’ Championship in Azerbaijan, but Seidl, the Team Principal at the Woking-based squad, says scoring points with both drivers on Sunday was a good result taking into account where they started and where they were on lap one.
“Regarding the race, from starting positions of P9 and P13, then P12 and P13 after the first lap, clearly the objective was to fight back, and not lose too much ground to our competitors in the Constructors’ Championship,” said Seidl.
“In those terms, to leave Baku with finishing positions of P5 and P9 is something we’ll take very happily. We were able to keep our cool through a difficult race packed with incidents, where we waited for opportunities and made decisive moves to finish with decent positions.
“Thanks today to the drivers, the trackside team, support from the MTC, and our colleagues at Mercedes HPP, all of whom contributed to a good recovery.”
Seidl says the team will go back home for a reset before making their way to the Circuit Paul Ricard in two weeks’ time for the French Grand Prix, with their objective to come back stronger and fight towards the front of the field, particularly in Qualifying.
“We’re going home now to reset and analyse this race weekend,” said Seidl. “The clear objective going forward to France and beyond is to qualify higher up the grid and, in doing so, make our Sundays a little easier.
“We’ll be pushing again at Paul Ricard to keep up the fight in the Constructors’ Championship.”
