McLaren have escaped with a warning after sending Lando Norris onto the track with a torch and a wrench inside his cockpit during free practice at the Miami Grand Prix. The Brit was keen to hit the ground running at the Miami International Autodrome but was forced to dive straight back into the pit lane after some of the mechanics' tools were left inside the car. "Yeah, there's just, you've left so many tools in the cockpit," he reported on the radio.

"Everything's just falling apart. I'll have to box this lap." When Norris was wheeled back into the McLaren garage, the Brit pulled a wrench and torch out of the cockpit and dumped them on the sidepod of his MCL39 machine. He was then allowed to go back out onto the racetrack to log laps in the only free practice session of this sprint weekend.

The stewards took note of McLaren's error, and Norris was called to the stewards ahead of the sprint shootout to discuss the "potential release of Car Four in an unsafe condition". Fortunately for Zak Brown's squad, they escaped with a warning, with the FIA revealing that the driver's speed in realising the problem 'prevented an unsafe or dangerous situation'.

This wasn't the only incident Norris was involved in that caught the eye of the stewards. The McLaren racer had a close call with Haas driver Esteban Ocon on the approach to Turn 17, and the Frenchman was subsequently placed under investigation. He was also slapped with a warning from the FIA.

Norris will be hoping for a smooth remainder of the weekend in Miami as he looks to close the 10-point gap to team-mate Oscar Piastri at the top of the Drivers' Championship standings. With extra sprint points on offer on Saturday, this could be a make-or-break event for the Bristol-born racer.

“We feel good and we feel confident that we’re the best, but the others are certainly not far behind and consistently putting pressure on us, so one little mistake and we’re behind and we’re not where we want to be," Norris said on Thursday.

“Otherwise it’s just another weekend; it’s another weekend where we’re trying to improve, others are trying to improve [to] try and get ahead of us. So, yeah, just making sure I have a good weekend and a clean weekend, that’s the main thing. I’m working on my things, I’m working on what to improve and trying to figure out all the things behind the scenes on what I need to do better on.

"It’s certainly not because of a lack of speed or lack of ability to do so – I’ve often led the way in Q1 and Q2, but always when I got to Q3 then it’s not gone to plan. I think there’s stuff from the driving side and other things from the car side where just things haven’t clicked, but I’m working on it and hopefully this weekend I put it into practice.”