F1 – Reigning world champions McLaren came away from the Formula One Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia 2026 wanting more after scoring 10 points between their superstar pairing of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris at Sepang International Circuit.
The Bahrain-backed team recovered from a chaotic start following a lengthy rain delay and made their way back through the field, with Piastri finishing in sixth and Norris ninth. They are now eager to improve as the season heads to Singapore next weekend for the back-end of F1’s triple-header.
“We know the work we have to do and that we need to keep pushing and bringing further developments to the car to close that gap,” said Piastri. “Our new parts are performing as expected, but everyone else is also improving, so we are not currently in the fight for wins. We’ll review it all and then focus on Singapore.”
Norris added: “The car is lacking pace, and we need to improve it significantly if we want to be competitive. I don’t think we could fight for more than P6 and P7 today, regardless of how we executed the race.
“I know I could have done better today, just as the team knows we have work to do in making the car quicker. We will learn from today and turn our focus to preparing for Singapore.”
Team principal Andrea Stella admitted that McLaren are not currently in the position they would like to be in the pecking order of F1’s ‘big four’ which also includes Mercedes, Ferrari, and Red Bull.
“The reality is that this weekend our car package was fourth in terms of performance,” he said. “Even if we’d got every decision spot on, I don’t think we could have achieved any higher than Oscar’s sixth place.
“We need to analyse the results of the last two races carefully and work out how to get our performance back to the level we saw around the summer break, when we secured two wins and three pole positions.
“Certainly, some of our direct rivals have taken a significant step forward – such as Red Bull – and now it’s up to us to respond so that we can get back into the fight for podium places and try to improve our position in both championships.”
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