Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri left the third-row grid slots empty at the 2026 Chinese Grand Prix: the two McLaren MCL40s did not take the start due to electrical problems apparently linked to their batteries. The affected components will be sent back to the AMG HPP facility in Brixworth, while the papaya cars will go directly to Japan. The causes of the failures have not yet been identified.
The reigning world champion team did not even make it to the starting grid in Shanghai. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri left the third-row positions vacant. This cannot be classified as a retirement but rather as a non-participation, a true blow for the team: both drivers were ready to leave the circuit shortly after the race began.
For Piastri, this has become an unfortunate habit, as just last Sunday in Melbourne, in front of his home crowd, he was unable to start due to an incident during the formation lap caused by a sudden surplus of hybrid power.
It is not a positive moment for McLaren, who are struggling with electrical problems linked to the Mercedes power units. Norris didn’t even move the nose of his MCL40 out of the garage, while Piastri made it to the grid but was returned to the pit lane. “Honestly, I don’t know how long the mechanics had been trying to figure out what happened,” explained Lando Norris. “They were working to identify the electrical problem, but the car never fired up.”
“We stayed active for the first two laps, in case there was a red flag or something else that might have given us luck. But nothing happened. We hoped that maybe something would magically start working. But not today.”
Things were not much different for Oscar Piastri. “Once on the grid with Oscar, we encountered an electrical issue with the power unit,” revealed Andrea Stella. “It seems to be two separate problems occurring simultaneously, preventing us from starting the race. It is an extremely unlucky coincidence: two different electrical faults happening at the same time.”
Early reports suggest the issues are battery-related. “We will move forward as a single team, investigating together with the HPP engineers. We’ll see what we can learn to ensure this does not happen again. The cars will go directly to Japan for the next round in Suzuka, while the affected parts will be sent to Brixworth.”
“The defective components will certainly be returned, in this case not to McLaren, but to HPP where they will be examined. We face this crisis together as a unified team, to solve the problem and move forward.”
The only previous instance where both McLaren cars did not take the start of a Grand Prix was at the 2005 United States GP, when Kimi Räikkönen and Juan Pablo Montoya returned to the pit lane at the end of the formation lap along with all other drivers using Michelin tires that risked failure on the oval banking, a decision made purely for safety reasons.
McLaren has already fallen 80 points behind Mercedes in the Constructors’ Championship standings. Currently third with 18 points, just one point ahead of Haas, this adds yet another chapter to the difficult start of the season for the Woking-based team.
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