Has McLaren already overtaken Ferrari to become the second-fastest team in 2024? It might very well be the case, according to the latest comments from Charles Leclerc. We all remember the monumental effort McLaren made in 2023 to bounce back from a disappointing start to the season. Everyone was expecting the Woking-based team to be the closest competitor to Red Bull in 2024. However, it was Ferrari that came out of the blocks as the second-fastest team, ahead of McLaren, Mercedes, and Aston Martin.

But after the Chinese Grand Prix weekend, it looks like McLaren has overtaken Ferrari in terms of both the single-lap pace and the race pace. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri qualified ahead of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz. However, there was a general opinion in the F1 community that the Ferraris would catch up and overtake the McLarens in the Grand Prix.

But nothing of that sort happened in the race. In fact, what happened was the opposite of what many predicted. Lando Norris finished the race in second, 10 seconds ahead of Charles Leclerc in 4th. What’s worse for Ferrari is that Leclerc felt he couldn’t even have finished ahead of Oscar Piastri if the Aussie hadn’t suffered floor damage to his car.

Speaking to the media in the post-race interviews, Leclerc said, “Honestly, the best result we could’ve got is this one, because unfortunately Mclaren was ahead in terms of race pace today. With the Mediums we weren’t bad, with the Hards this was the pace. It’s incredible, we were half a second slower. The surprise was Lando [Norris], the McLarens. I believe Oscar [Piastri] had floor damage, otherwise it would’ve been difficult to even finish P4. It’s [the race pace] a bad surprise.“

However, that was not the only interesting thing to happen. It turns out that Lando Norris had even made a bet ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix, which he fortunately lost!

Lando Norris is relieved to have lost the bet!

Despite qualifying ahead of both Ferraris, Lando Norris was sure that Leclerc and Sainz would have better race pace and would challenge the McLarens for race positions early in the race. He was so sure that he even placed a bet, as he revealed post-race, on how far behind the Ferrari cars McLaren would finish, confidently predicting a 35-second gap.

However, his bet turned out to be far off the mark, as McLaren showed exceptional pace and tire management. “I made it a bet too how far behind the Ferrari we would finish today and I thought 35 seconds and I was very wrong by that,” said Norris. “So yeah happy to be wrong with myself for my own bets but yeah good day for everyone,” the driver further added.

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Norris even found it surprising that Ferrari was slower than him over the race distance. “I was surprised by many things. The lack of pace from Ferrari today, our good pace and I guess more us compared to the Red Bull which was surprising… So it’s a pleasant surprise but it shows the team has done a good job. We’re working hard and it’s paying off,” he said.

It seems Lando Norris will be hoping to prove himself wrong on many more occasions this year! Do you think he’ll be able to do it? Let us know what you think!