Norris on pole at Zandvoort but expects a tougher Dutch Grand Prix after sprint setback

Lando Norris took pole position for the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort on Saturday, beginning the first race after Formula 1's summer break from the same grid slot he occupied at the Hungarian Grand Prix a month ago. Reigning world champion Lando Norris is fifth in this year's standings.

Norris said he does not expect the race to unfold as comfortably as his victory in Budapest, citing lessons from Saturday's sprint. He began the sprint second to Mercedes' George Russell, the reverse of their grand prix grid order, but Russell won the sprint while Norris lost ground to Ferrari's Charles Leclerc in the closing stages. "I'm not thinking of tomorrow," he said, "just thinking: I'm on pole. Let me enjoy it. I will do my preparation tonight, prepare well, learn as much as we can from this morning, see what we can do better."

Norris described his pole lap as taken "right on the ragged edge" and said McLaren's one-lap performance improved with low fuel and fresh tyres. "We could have been on pole yesterday," he said. "The sprint race disappointed me quite a bit because of our pace. I knew we would be a little better come qualifying because of the low fuel and new tyres, and my final two laps I put things together a lot more. My final lap was not the cleanest or best lap I've ever done but I committed a lot more in my braking and took a lot more risks in the high-speed corners. It was a lap that was a lot more uncomfortable, one where I was hustling and sliding a lot more, reacting a lot more to the car - which is not necessarily the best way to go about qualifying but it worked today."

Sector analysis showed Norris exploiting McLaren's strength through the middle sector, including the high-speed downhill Turn Seven known as Scheivlak, where he was fastest and 0.28secs quicker than Russell. That middle-sector advantage was sufficient for pole despite Norris being only fourth and seventh-quickest respectively in the first and final sectors, which include slower corners.

The team acknowledged that the high-speed advantage may translate less effectively over a race distance than in qualifying, when fresh rubber allows more aggression. The report notes that in races drivers often back off in high-speed corners to avoid overheating the tyres, and that this issue contributed to Norris challenging Russell early in the sprint before his pace dropped off markedly at about one-third distance. On preparing for those trade-offs Norris said: "I'll see what compromises I can make between high and low speed, see how we can make our weaknesses not as much as a struggle. We just need to work hard. If we work hard and prepare well, it's possible. But I am not expecting a race like Budapest. I am expecting a challenge. But I am looking forward to it."

Russell, who won the sprint, acknowledged McLaren's straight-line high-speed pace but said tyre temperatures limit how much that speed can be used in a race. "They are very fast in the high-speed but I don't think that will give them as much of an opportunity to use that pace as in qualifying," he said, "because it puts too much temperature into the tyres. But pole is the best place to start, especially on a circuit where it's difficult to overtake." The sprint victory moved Russell three points closer to his Mercedes team-mate Kimi Antonelli, but Russell remains 56 points adrift in the drivers' championship following the sprint on Saturday.

Russell said a mental reset over the summer break had improved his approach and performance this weekend, pointing to differing driving styles between him and Antonelli. "The truth is, obviously Kimi's been doing an amazing job this season, and clearly the two of us have quite different driving styles," Russell said. "That was apparent last year, and it is really working well for him with this car and these tyres. And just trying to implement something similar into my driving style. I kind of describe it as, like, if you change your golf swing, you'll probably take half a step back before making those improvements. The break just allowed me to put those learnings into the back of my mind, come here this weekend, not fixating on what I want to try and achieve with the car and the tyres, but knowing in the back of my head what I need to achieve and just drive more freely. I'm really, really proud of that because it's just sort of building that toolbox of experience for me that's going to allow me to be even better in the years to come. After the break, I just feel way more relaxed. I don't feel like I've got anything to lose. The pressure's off. I'm just going to go out, enjoy it, and I don't even really feel in a fight. It's not mine to lose, it's mine to gain. So that's the mentality I've got, and I feel it's going to help me. I'm just enjoying driving."

Kimi Antonelli was marginally off Norris and Russell in qualifying, 0.031secs slower than Russell and 0.133secs shy of pole, and said errors in sector one cost him time. "0.1secs off pole hurts a little bit because I had a really bad sector one in my last lap," Antonelli said. "It's never a good feeling when you see you are 0.2secs down in sector one. I was able to make it up in sector two and three but still not good enough performance-wise because I think we had a real shot today at pole. It was a very good wake-up call this weekend, that you can never lower your guard because when you do that... I did a mistake yesterday and today I did a mistake in Q3. So, it's not that I'm driving more tense or anything, but I just feel this weekend is a good wake-up call, and to just again put things in the right place at the right time and just deliver the result when it counts."

The Dutch Grand Prix is scheduled for 23 August at 14:00 BST, with live commentary on Sports Extra and live text updates available on the BBC Sport website and app.