“It’s so easy to get caught up into comparisons, just because we’re all competitive so you always want to see yourself doing well and feeling like you can be quick,” Norris smiled. “But I think we understood a lot, both in lower-fuel stuff, higher-fuel stuff, the tyres.
“Just what we came here to do really, [which] is to understand the car, especially from a reliability point of view – make sure that all the sensors are working as they should, the PU’s working as it should, the gearbox, whatever it is.
“[Making sure] everything is just doing what we expect, because reliability is one of the most important things, so a lot of it’s from that side, and a lot of it is stuff over the next few days and weeks the team will look into and try to improve on and make better. And from my side, just to get back comfy with the car, some little bits I need to change here and there, but otherwise it still feels like a race car, still feels fast and still enjoyable.”
Over at Ferrari, Leclerc said of his morning in the SF-26: “It was good again. We went through our programme, we did everything we wanted to do. We pushed a little bit more as well, which was nice to feel a little bit the limit of this car and to understand a little bit more of it as well. I’m happy because again we’ve gone through our programme and done everything we wanted.”
Following a busy week at the shakedown, the Monegasque admitted that there is “a lot of excitement, not only in Ferrari but I think around the whole paddock”.
“It’s an exciting time for Formula 1, where there’s so much change that we’ve got to adapt as drivers, we’ve got to adapt as teams and try and find ways to maximise what is now our new package, and especially with this energy management that is so much more important compared to the past,” Leclerc explained.
