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Norris: Qualifying crash "ruins the whole weekend"

McLaren Formula 1 junior Lando Norris believes he had a good chance to take pole for F2's Monaco feature race, but his crash in qualifying "ruins the whole weekend".

Lando Norris, Carlin, hits the barriers

Lando Norris, Carlin, hits the barriers

Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

Norris was the early leader in his qualifying group, but hit the barriers at the exit of the second swimming pool chicane.

The collision bent his Carlin's steering wheel and also broke his front wing, which forced him to pit and he did not have enough time to improve again.

Norris reckons he could have taken pole, which instead went to one of his main rivals Alexander Albon, and now fears his qualifying mistake "ruins his whole weekend":

"The car was good enough for pole,” said the F2 points-leader. "It’s a costly mistake and it kind of ruins the whole weekend.

"[But] anything can happen here in Monaco, so we’ll just keep working and try to maximise what we get from those two races."

Norris explained that he carried more speed than before by taking the Turn 13-14 part "flat", which caught him out in the subsequent chicane.

The lack of another downshift robbed the car of engine braking, sending the car wide with oversteer on the exit and into the wall.

"I went out and got a good warm-up in, didn’t have any traffic and all was looking good," added the Brit. 

"Sector one and sector two were pretty decent, but then, because I went flat in the swimming pool section, I had to shift up a gear which I hadn’t done in the whole of the previous session.

"I went into the next one and you’re just pushing a tiny bit more, and I just couldn’t get the second downshift done in time."

Having ended up ninth in his group and received a three-place grid penalty for impeding Albon, Norris is set to start Friday's feature race in 18th.

Norris' teammate Sergio Sette Camara, who is due to start fourth, was sent to the medical centre to check his hand after his crash.

The Brazilian hit the wall at Ste Devote, and said on the radio that his hand could be broken.

Russell to gamble on strategy

Barcelona feature race winner George Russell said he will attempt an off-sync strategy in a bid to recover from his lowly 17th place on the grid.

"Strategy is going to be interesting, we’ll either have to go extremely long or extremely short," he said.

The Mercedes junior went into qualifying with just four laps under his belt in practice due to an engine failure, and was only ninth in his group.

Russell said that another issue with the car cost him a chance to be on the first three rows on the grid.

"There’s an issue with the car, the idle is set too high, so if you get the hairpin wrong, you get the idle and it just pushes forwards," he added.

"I must have lost sixth tenths on my best lap. I genuinely feel like I could have been top three in that group. Every lap I was improving by at least a second a lap."

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