Albert Park Circuit, Friday, 6 March

Find out what happened during FP1 and FP2 in Melbourne, and get the thoughts of McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Chief Technical Officer & Chief Designer Rob Marshall.

As F1 returns to action for the 2026 season in Melbourne’s Albert Park, the McLaren Mastercard team ended the day on a positive note, with Oscar topping the timesheet in FP2. However, with a few reliability issues in FP1 and FP2, the team still has much to learn about extracting maximum performance from the MCL40 for Qualifying and the Australian Grand Prix.

Learning about energy management was top of the agenda, and a key aim was to give the drivers as many laps as possible. This didn’t begin smoothly, with Oscar having power unit calibration issues. These were resolved throughout FP1 and are a valuable learning experience as we continue to develop our understanding of the new power units. Oscar was able to complete a compromised run plan and the session in P6.

Lando’s car suffered some more substantial issues during FP1, reporting rough gear shifts. The team attempted to diagnose the problem in the garage, but ultimately, he had to climb out of the car with 20 minutes remaining. A transmission control issue required the gearbox to be repaired to prevent further compromise to the day’s run plan in FP2. He ultimately finished FP1 in P19.

FP2 was smoother, though Lando again suffered gremlins early in the hour. Despite this, he was able to put together a solid lap count with a long stint in the final 25 minutes, finishing the session P7. Oscar had a much smoother FP2 and was happy the car was delivering a more consistent feeling than it had in the morning. His single Quali-sim lap left him two-tenths clear of the field.

The team will now review further opportunities overnight and explore in which direction to take the setup of the car ahead of tomorrow’s Qualifying.

Oscar Piastri

"That’s the first day done. A lot of learnings but overall, a reasonably good day. FP1 was tricky and we had a few power unit calibration issues at the beginning, but we resolved them during the session. FP2 ran smoothly and we were able to find a bit more consistency and the car behaved more as we expected, which was good. We’ll review what we’ve learned today so that we can find more tomorrow ahead of the first Quali of the year."

Lando Norris

"A tricky first day, but it’s good to be back in the car for the start of a new season. We didn’t get as much running done as we wanted to this morning, due to some reliability issues, so we’re a little bit behind in terms of running and learnings. With these new regulations, time in the car is very important, so we’ve got a bit of work to do this evening to recover. We’ve got some good bits of data to go over from the second half of FP2, and there’s plenty we can learn from what our competitors have been doing. We’ll work hard tonight and try to close that gap before we get back in the car for FP3 tomorrow."

Rob Marshall

Chief Technical Officer & Chief Designer

"A positive day overall, with some trickier moments, but lots of learning across all aspects of these new regulation cars. In FP1, we investigated a problem on Lando’s car which confirmed a transmission control issue which we resolved ahead of the next session. FP2 ran a little more smoothly, with the drivers finding more consistency and gaining more valuable data across varying runs including qualifying simulations.

"We’re in a reasonable position in regard to getting the car dialled in, but overnight we’ll review where we can keep making steps forward, focusing across all aspects of car setup, tyres and power unit management and optimisation. With limited practice time before Qualifying, everyone is still refining their approach, and we saw improvements from FP1 to FP2 across the board. Going into Qualifying tomorrow, we hope to be in the fight - precision matters more than ever and it will be important to ensure we execute the preparation perfectly with the expected traffic. We look forward to getting back on track."

Follow all of the action this weekend via the McLaren Racing App, available to download on Android and iOS.