2026 Italian Grand Prix - Practice Report

Monza, Friday, 4 September

Find out what happened during FP1 and FP2 in Italy, and get the thoughts of McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Advanced Engineering Technical Director Neil Houldey.

The McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team completed a productive first day of running at Monza as preparations began with the opening Free Practice sessions at the 2026 Italian Grand Prix.

Today’s performance sits as the team expected coming into the race weekend, but not where the team wants to be. Some improvements were made from Free Practice 1 to Free Practice 2, but the team still has work to do overnight to unlock more potential within the MCL40, in order to be able to compete with the leading teams for the race victory. It is clear that at this stage, the team are a little way off the leading pack and not in contention to fight for the victory.

In Free Practice 1, Lando Norris finished sixth with a best time of 1m23.719s, while Oscar Piastri was 11th after setting a 1m24.184s lap. Both drivers completed 26 laps as the team worked through a busy programme tailored to Monza’s high-speed, lower downforce demands, exploring different set-up directions, fuel loads and tyre programmes.

The MCL40 featured minor aerodynamic updates for the weekend, including the introduction of the H-Wing that had previously been driven only during practice at the 2026 Hungarian Grand Prix. Lando ran the highly anticipated H-Wing in the opening session, giving the team a useful comparison as it assessed its aerodynamic options. Both drivers then used the H-Wing in Free Practice 2, continuing their varied run plans as McLaren gathered further data. Lando finished P4 with 25 laps to his name, while Oscar also completed 25 laps and finished the session in P6.

As anticipated, the Temple of Speed’s layout has presented a markedly different challenge from the circuits where the MCL40 has been strongest in recent races either side of the summer shutdown. The long straights place a premium on power-unit deployment, an area that remains an important consideration and area for improvement going into Saturday’s Qualifying and Sunday’s race day.

With the competitive order closely matched and varying from circuit to circuit, the team expects a challenging battle at the front among the leading four teams. With plenty of useful data collected, attention now turns to reviewing this overnight and refining the set-up of both cars ahead of Free Practice 3 and Qualifying. The ultimate focus will remain on maximising the package this weekend and putting both drivers in the strongest possible position to secure a solid starting spot for Sunday’s race.

In other track action at Monza this weekend, Matteo De Palo topped his FIA Formula 3 Qualifying group and will start tomorrow’s Sprint Race from P2. Elsewhere in the McLaren Driver Development Programme, Christian Costoya qualified P4 in Italian Formula 4 at Imola, while Dries Van Langendonck will take part in British Formula 4 Qualifying tomorrow at Croft Circuit after two productive Practice sessions today.

Off track, 2025 Drivers’ World Champion, Lando Norris was awarded Driver of the Year in the 2026 Confartigianato Motori Awards, a historic Italian recognition created by APA Confartigianato Imprese Milano Monza e Brianza.

“The pace isn’t where we need it to be right now. Oddly, we need to find performance in the corners where we expected to be strong, while we’re a bit better than expected in the ones we thought would be difficult. It’s very tight at the front and the group behind isn’t far off either, so we’ll work overnight to find gains, but it's going to be tough.

“I don’t think we’re in the fight for Pole right now, so the priority is to focus on execution and come away with a decent result. If we can tidy up the balance and make the right changes, we can still put ourselves in a decent position, even if we’re not quite where we want to be on outright performance.”

“Day one in Monza done. We’ve learned a decent amount and collected a lot of data, which gives us a solid foundation to work from overnight. There’s lots for us still to learn and maximise as we don’t have the pace we need right now. We’ll focus on unlocking more performance overnight and see what more we can take from FP3 into Qualifying.”

Neil Houldey

Technical Director – Applied Engineering

“We're reasonably pleased with the car's balance between high and low-speed sections, though we are around three-tenths off where we want to be. The new H-Wing performed well, as we expected following the testing put in at the factory, and we now anticipate it to add performance as we head into the rest of the weekend. Our focus this evening will be on fine-tuning the energy management, as there is still an opportunity to find lap time through better harvesting and deployment. It’s about finding those last few fractions of a second to close the gap with the teams ahead.

“Looking ahead to Qualifying, it will certainly be tricky to fight for Pole from our current position, so we remain hopeful rather than expectant. However, that doesn't stop us from working hard overnight to extract every bit of performance. We'll be looking for small gains from the car and the drivers, and I'm confident we will be a little bit closer. The competition is tight, and while Ferrari seems to have made a good step with their upgrade, our focus is on maximising our own package."