McLaren expect intense tyre degradation

      In the sprint qualifying, which concluded the first day of the race weekend in Austin, McLaren drivers posted the second- and third-fastest times. Lando Norris was just 0.071 seconds behind Max Verstappen, who took pole, while Oscar Piastri was a little further back — just under four tenths — but the Australian admitted he made a few mistakes on his decisive run.

      “I think these results more or less reflect the real picture,” commented Andrea Stella, McLaren’s team principal. “It definitely confirms that Red Bull Racing have improved their car. Right now they are quite competitive and can fight for pole positions and wins at any type of circuit.

      “But the positive thing is that our car is also competitive in Austin compared with some other tracks where we had a few difficulties. Obviously these are not the results we wanted, because we are here to fight for poles, but it’s still not bad.

      “At the same time I believe we’ve laid a good foundation for the sprint, and we also have the opportunity to work out in which areas we can still refine the fine settings of the car to find some extra speed and on Saturday make another attempt to fight for pole in the main qualifying.

      “If we talk about the upcoming sprint, on this track the signs of tyre degradation should be more pronounced because the weather here is very hot. I suppose at some previous rounds we saw that races were more like a procession because the tyres were not subject to intense degradation.

      “I would expect that during the sprint and the Sunday race the nature of the on-track battle will be more interesting, and we may see more frequent changes of position, which is related to tyre behaviour. Usually our car works quite well when tyre degradation occurs — and that’s just one of many reasons explaining why we are already looking forward to Saturday’s sprint.”