A run of poor form for McLaren has seen it slip out of contention in the𝄹 race for third in the constructors’ ch❀ampionship with Norris and Daniel Ricciardo scoring just four points between them in F1’s latest triple-header.

It was another case of bad luck♚ for No🥀rris in Qatar when McLaren called him in for a surprise pit stop on Lap 49.

The hard tyres he was running on were only 24 laps old when he suffe🦩red the unexpected puncture.

Norris was on course to finish𒀰 fourth ahead of the t﷽wo Ferraris, but instead, he finished ninth.

McLaren now trail💙s Ferrari by 39.5 points with two rounds to🦋 go.

“The last few races we made some mistakes,” Norri♔s said. “Today we did a better job than them. The c𒉰ar was pretty strong today. 

“We ♕had a good car on race day. Even better than I expected. I was happy and I could push a lot. We should have been P4. If we got everything right maybe we could have challenged for P3, but𒈔 with Fernando you do not expect an easy overtake if I tried. 

“We should’ve had a lot more points than Ferrari today. They are a long way ahead and furtꦆher away now. They did that because they deserved it and they were there on performance. But when you have days like today the🅰re is nothing you can do.”

After a run of poor races, McLaren 💙team boss Andreas Seidl wants to end the season onꦇ a high, even if his squad misses out on third in the championship.

“So I think whatꦑ’s left for us is making sure we do those last two races, keep fighting as for as long as it’s theoretically possible we will give it all for the constructors’ championship and we simply want to finish on a high and simply score ꦡsome good results again going into the winter break,” Seidl added.