Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri flex their muscles in FP2 at F1 Austrian Grand Prix

Despite their significant lead in the Formula 1 Constructors’ Championship standings, McLaren introduced a set of upgrades for the Austrian Grand Prix, aiming to unlock even more performance from the MCL39.

The early returns are more than positive.

After Oscar Piastri and development driver Alex Dunne posted the third- and fourth-fastest times in FP1, Piastri and Lando Norris took to the track for the second hour of practice Friday at the Red Bull Ring. The pair topped the timing sheets with a strong performance, as Norris went fastest with a lap time of 1:04.580 on a set of soft tires followed by Piastri in P2, just 0.157 seconds off Norris’ pace.

Max Verstappen was third, 0.318 seconds behind Norris. Lance Stroll and Charles Leclerc rounded out the top five.

George Russell, who was fastest in FP1, finished sixth in the second session.

Here are the full results from FP2 at the Austrian Grand Prix:

According to McLaren, the team brought three different “performance” upgrades to the Austrian Grand Prix: Changes to the front suspension, the front corner of the MCL39, and the rear corner of the MCL39. The team believes that the upgrades will generate “overall improvement of clow condition which results in an aerodynamic performance gain.”

Reports from Austria indicate that the upgrades are aimed at helping Norris get a handle on the MCL39.

“There’s obviously a lot more detail that we get in the debriefs from Lando,” McLaren Technical Director of Engineering Neil Houldey said. “I think we’ve got an understanding of what he needs to improve the car, and some of the upgrades that we’ve got have been biased towards his comments.

“As you’d expect, you’re trying to work out what the drivers need, and you tailor your upgrades to suit them, but I think we’ve got a good understanding of what he does need, and we’re able to make small improvements in a number of areas that will and have helped him over the last few races, and will continue to help him moving forward.”

The McLaren engineer then elaborated on what Norris wants from the MCL39.

“It’s just about being able, for him, to be able to feel the tires on the limit a little bit better,” Houldey said. “So we’ve just made some small kinematic adjustments that we know will be better.

“They had some small negatives that we didn’t necessarily want to introduce at the start of the year. Running earlier on in the season gave us confidence that, actually, that wasn’t going to be a problem, so we were able to introduce this change without any real concern that it wouldn’t be any worse and should be better.

“With all of these things we are trying to find the best of a number of different scenarios and it was the same with the suspension. We were concerned in one area, we worked out that wasn’t a concern during the season and you are just trading things to try and find the most optimum performance – which, for Lando, we think we’ve now found.”

The early returns are overwhelmingly positive, but Fridays have been kind to Norris this season. The true challenge comes tomorrow, as qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix begins. Norris has been dominant at times on Fridays and in the first two segments of qualifying this season, but failed to put together the lap he needed in Q3.

We’ll see if that changes tomorrow at Red Bull Ring.