Lando Norris has clawed his way back into the 2026 title fight, but he's still sitting 83 points behind Andrea Kimi Antonelli with 11 races to go. The McLaren driver's back-to-back victories in Hungary and the Netherlands proved the papaya team has finally got on top of the new regulations, but there's a massive mountain to climb. Everything now hinges on whether McLaren's new Macarena rear wing can deliver the performance boost they desperately need when it debuts at Monza.

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Mercedes absolutely dominated the opening third of the season with Antonelli and George Russell sharing the poles at every race and winning eight of the first ten. It's only Ferrari managing to break their stranglehold thanks to Lewis Hamilton's first red win in Barcelona and Charles Leclerc's victory in Britain. But Norris changed that narrative completely in Hungary by not only taking pole position away from Mercedes but also delivering a genuine race win. Following up in the Netherlands showed it wasn't a one-off either.

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The real problem is that McLaren's 2026 car was built on a weak foundation. The team poured all their resources into getting Norris over the line for last year's title, which meant their new regulations development took a hit. Mercedes, meanwhile, made the smart call to abandon 2025 early and focus entirely on 2026, which is why they've been so strong. Now McLaren's rolling out the Macarena rear wing at Monza after testing it through Leonardo Fornaroli in Hungary's free practice. The hope is that it'll slash drag and finally make them competitive on the low-downforce circuits where they've struggled.

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There's already buzz that McLaren have another low-downforce upgrade package coming for Baku too. Norris is clearly banking on the high-downforce tracks like the new Madrid, Singapore, Interlagos and Qatar to claw back points, while Antonelli figures to pocket wins at the low-downforce races like Monza, Azerbaijan, Malaysia, Austin, Mexico City, Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi. Monza becomes absolutely crucial because if Norris can actually threaten for the win there, it'd prove the Macarena rear wing is the game-changer McLaren need. That's the only way he's realistically getting back in this title fight.

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