Lando Norris handed brutal penalty days before Belgian GP as McLaren issue statement

Lando Norris has been handed a penalty days before the Belgian Grand Prix, with McLaren forced to issue a statement clarifying the situation.

Reigning champion Norris, who is currently fifth in the Drivers' Championship after nine races, is preparing for a home race at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit as his mother is from Belgium.

However, Norris has been punished prior to the race after McLaren confirmed will use a new power electronics unit.

It will be the fourth element Norris has used this season and rules stipulate that reaching that tally brings an automatic 10-place grid penalty.

Norris is unable to start higher than 11th and McLaren explained that they have elected to take the penalty in Belgium as they believe overtakes will be easier to achieve.

A statement from McLaren read: "Car Number 1's first power electronics unit suffered a terminal issue in China, which meant Lando was unable to start the race.

"Lando's second power electronics unit, fitted in Japan, needed to be withdrawn for remedial work after suffering issues in Free Practice, which necessitated moving to a third and final power electronics unit within the permitted allocation. While the second power electronics unit was able to be repaired after the Japanese Grand Prix, it suffered a terminal issue in FP2 in Monaco, and was withdrawn from our allocation once again.

"While the power electronics unit we installed in Japan, and have used in every session since Miami, has worked reliably, Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains has since introduced a series of reliability fixes to their new power electronics systems.

"However, in order to take advantage of these improvements, we must incur a 10-place grid penalty on Lando's car in order to take a new unit.

"We have chosen to do this in Belgium, a circuit where overtaking is relatively more prevalent, as opposed to the following two events in Hungary and Zandvoort. We now plan to use this fourth power electronics unit for the remainder of the season, in order to maximise reliability while minimising sporting penalties on Lando."

Norris is 82 points behind leader Kimi Antonelli of Mercedes after a tricky 2026 season.