Yas Marina Circuit, Friday, 6 December

Hear from McLaren Formula 1 drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, Ryo Hirakawa, and Team Principal Andrea Stella, after Free Practice for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

FP1	1m24.542s (+0.221s)	25 laps	2nd
FP2	1m23.517s	25 laps	1st

“A good first day in the car, things are feeling good but there’s some room to improve ahead of tomorrow’s Quali. I think we might have shown more performance than our competitors today. We won’t get ahead of ourselves, but we’ll stay focused to keep pushing as a team throughout the weekend.” 

FP2

1m23.751s (+0.234s)

28 laps

2nd

“It was a good session for us today. I was comfortable in the car from the first lap and the pace was strong. I’m feeling in a good spot going into tomorrow, but the competition is also looking decent. Thank you to Ryo for his support in FP1 this morning and for giving us valuable data. We’ll continue to make tweaks overnight and ensure we continue with this momentum into tomorrow.” 

Ryo Hirakawa #28

FP1

1m25.874s (+1.553s)

19 laps

14th

"Firstly, I want to say thank you to the team for the opportunity to drive in FP1. It was a great experience, and I really enjoyed being on track in the MCL38. I had lots of work to do supporting the team doing aero tests with the rakes, with some push laps at the end, which all went to plan. I appreciate the efforts of everyone who prepared me for this, from the time in the sim to the MCL36 tests. Best of luck to the entire team this weekend in the battle for the Constructors’ title.” 

"It’s been a decent start to this final race of the season, both sessions ran smoothly today. 

"In the first session, Ryo Hirakawa drove Oscar’s car. There was work to do with test items and data acquisition, which he executed diligently and precisely. He has my thanks for his contribution to the team, and I’d also like to say well done. His performance run was impressive, both in terms of immediate pace, but also how well he assimilated feedback from his engineers. We wish him all the best.  

"Otherwise, the car seems to be behaving pretty much as expected with the strengths and the weaknesses that we anticipated. We need to stay focused, and maximise our performance for the remainder of the weekend."