(Motorsport-Total.com) – That was a clear sign of life from McLaren in qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix. Not only did Lando Norris stop the pole streak of the Mercedes factory team in the 2026 Formula 1 season with his Q3 best time, but teammate Oscar Piastri also presented himself stronger on Saturday at the Hungaroring than on many weekends so far this season.
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In fact, Norris was not only the fastest in the Q3 segment, but also in the third free practice (FP3) as well as in the Q1 and Q2 segments. Piastri improved from eighth to fifth position during the three-part qualifying. The Australian will even start the race from third position, thus from the second row. The reason for this is the three-place grid penalties for Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Antonelli.
Hamilton’s grid penalty was issued because the Ferrari driver, of all people, stood in Piastri’s way in Q3. The scene occurred in Turn 1, which has been named after three-time Formula 1 world champion Nelson Piquet since Friday.
As for McLaren, the MCL40 received an upgrade for the last race weekend before the Formula 1 summer break. And it’s showing its effect, as Norris’s performance, above all, proves. Although his lap of 1:17.207 minutes in the second Q3 attempt was “not my cleanest lap, but still good enough for pole”.
Polesitter Lando Norris believes there was more to come
“If I had had a third attempt, I probably could have found quite a bit more lap time. I didn’t have a third attempt, but I’m still really happy to be back,” says the 2025 Formula 1 world champion, for whom this is now his first pole as defending champion. For McLaren, too, as mentioned at the outset, it is their first pole in the current 2026 season.
Norris, however, does not yet want to speak of a turning point. “Let’s wait and see. That was just qualifying. Sunday’s race will be long and difficult,” he says. At the same time, Norris highlights as positive that “we seem to have the potential this weekend that we already saw last weekend in Spa”.
“But once again: you can’t rely solely on a good qualifying. What’s needed now is a good race. Afterwards, as we know, we have the summer break. When that’s over, we want to try to repeat what we showed today a few more times. We are working hard for that. We knew we were behind, but we are making progress. Today was proof of that,” says Norris.
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Oscar Piastri annoyed about Q3 final phase
Piastri didn’t quite get along as well as teammate Norris on Saturday, but says: “I felt the car was a bit better in today’s track conditions. I just had to manage to adapt to it.”
Alluding to the fact that he was held up by Hamilton on his second Q3 attempt, Piastri only adds: “It’s a shame I couldn’t show what the car was capable of on my last lap. The upgrades worked well, anyway.”
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella is quite surprised that one of his two drivers, namely Norris, managed to get pole. “We saw that the upgrades work well. With them, we managed to make the car a few tenths of a second faster. But I never expected it would be enough to get pole,” Stella told Sky.
For Sunday’s 70-lap race, the McLaren team principal sees Ferrari, not his own team or Mercedes, as the favorite: “Honestly, I think Ferrari is still the favorite. Yes, neither of them improved on their last attempt [in Q3], but I think they still have a bit of performance up their sleeve.”
Stella thus refers not least to the fact that the Ferrari drivers had won both Friday practice sessions. In FP1, Charles Leclerc was the fastest, in FP2 it was teammate Hamilton. Leclerc starts Sunday from P2 next to polesitter Norris. Hamilton, however, only starts the race from P5 due to his grid penalty (Starting grid for the 2026 Hungarian Grand Prix).
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