Lando Norris believes McLaren have every chance of being able to fight for the world championship titles next season after winning the Miami Grand Prix.
He became Formula 1 newest grand prix winner last weekend in Miami after McLaren introduced their first major upgrade package of the season.Having achieved his first race win after over 100 grands prix starts, Norris said McLaren are “100%” capable of going further and becoming championship contenders next year.
“I’m saying that still with my feet on the ground – absolutely,” Norris told Sky during celebrations at McLaren’s Woking factory.
“I want to believe we’ve got two great drivers, as Zak [Brown, team principal] normally says. I’ve got an amazing team behind me, we have an amazing team behind us and we’re closer than ever.
“As I said at the beginning of this year, we can win races. I want to believe and I should have the confidence to say next year we can go for more, we can go for the next step. But, we have a lot more work to do and we’re working hard to try to achieve it.”
Asked if he believes he will change as a driver and become even stronger as a result of securing his first victory, Norris says both he and his McLaren team have more confidence in themselves following their success.
“I’m the same me, I’m the same person. I believed at the beginning of the year we could win races – and we have. We’ve won that first one. So have the faith.
“I have the confidence that we can do it as a team and I think we proved exactly that. I’m sure something’s changed or something inside has changed because I’m a race-winner now. But at the same time, it doesn’t change how I approach things. I’m still the same guy. I still want to win more. It makes you more hungry for wanting it more than I ever had before.”
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Following McLaren’s successful upgrade in Miami, Norris believes that there could be strong competition at the front of the field between his team, champions Red Bull and Ferrari over the remaining 18 rounds of the championship.
“We can win more races this year,” he said. “I think we can compete against Red Bull. I think we’re looking at an exciting season between us, Red Bull, Ferrari.
“We still have work to do. We’re not at the level that they are just yet. There’s going to be races that we’re competitive enough, but on average, we’re not quite where we want to be. I think we still have our feet on the ground, we know we have more work to do, but as soon as they’ve all had a little drink this morning, I’m going to tell them to get back to work so we can keep fighting even more.”
Norris will likely have to challenge world champion Max Verstappenif he is to become a world champion in the future. But he believes his good relationship with the Red Bull driver will not be soured if they were to become title rivals.
“We have respect for one another,” Norris said. “We get along. We’re not best friends – we don’t text each other every day, that kind of thing. But, we just have a lot of respect from him to me and me back to him.
“I look forward to it. I want to challenge him. I want to race against him. I want to battle, because I think he’s one of the best drivers ever in Formula 1. So if I can prove myself against him, I’m proving myself against one of the best and that’s exactly what I want to do.”
Celebrating his victory with the McLaren team, Norris says everyone at the factory will be more motivated to achieve more wins over the rest of the season.
“I was confident I could achieve what we have done this weekend and we can achieve it many more times this year and as you can see, what it means to them, it means just as much to me, and I want to continue sharing even more race wins and championships together with them,” he said. “So that’s our plan.”
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2024 Miami Grand Prix
- McLaren had superior pace before Verstappen’s damage in Miami – Norris
- Sainz ‘struggles to understand’ why he got penalty when Perez didn’t
- Alonso’s unusual brake problem and more unheard Miami team radio
- McLaren’s Miami upgrade success points to even stronger form in coming races
- Norris expects more wins this year and believes “100%” in 2025 title bid
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
9th May 2024, 23:03
Winning more races this year why not, some fighting with red bull, even if not for the championship would be interesting, the 2019 season wasn’t very competitive for example but there were 3 teams that could win on merit.
Aiming for a title in 2025 seems premature, so far mclaren didn’t prove to be consistently a top team ever since 2012, they’ve had spells where they were really competitive, for example in 2021 they were strong in russia, monza, spa, around that period, but never for a full year.
Gusm.ai
9th May 2024, 23:11
The Mclaren development shows how much Mercedes got wrong with their car.
Lets say Mclaren has access to the latest iteration of the Mercedes power unit, Mclaren seemed to design and improve their car to a point the Piastri is usuallt having good races (for a rookie), meanwhile Mercedes got stuck in a bad concept from two years ago with no remedy in 2024.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th May 2024, 6:23
I hope so, but I’m reserved for now.
Denis (@denis1304)
10th May 2024, 10:12
Vettel’s one finger is back?
Jay
10th May 2024, 10:59
I thought Max was going to win every race ‘with ease’. Funny that about predictions!
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
10th May 2024, 15:30
he let Lando win. He didn’t even try to push. You could tell how relaxed he was with the result after the race too. Pirelli are playing games, but RB still have at least a second on the field, and no, Lando’s power unit is doing nothing against the Honda on the straight.
Mr A
10th May 2024, 21:54
You’re LOLful
Mayrton
11th May 2024, 14:04
Haha that made me laugh. Always good if people explicitly admit colour.
P. Verstappen
13th May 2024, 11:26
Max had damage and Lando was lucky with the safetycar. If that all wasn’t the case I wonder if he had won, but congrats to him anyway.
Mog
10th May 2024, 11:40
Lando just became ungovernable
gDog (@gdog)
10th May 2024, 12:07
Watchout Perez.
If McLaren really are back at the front consistently and Max is being genuinely challenged, Red Bull are going to want a number 2 at least mixing it in the top 3 to help out, not 4+
Assuming Red Bull aren’t about to collapse in the heap in the next two years.
Edvaldo
10th May 2024, 15:28
Won a race on a an unusual weak weekend from Max and Red Bull and is already talking about a title bid lol.
Vulture
10th May 2024, 16:05
It wasn’t a weak weekend for Max. The safety car fell in favour of Lando and Lando was there when it mattered. Simple.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th May 2024, 20:49
Vulture But even if he rejoined in P2, i.e., if the SC didn’t pick up the wrong driver, he would’ve still won, given the same advantages he had either way.
MichaelN
10th May 2024, 22:15
He had a scruffy qualifying and he was genuinely surprised that he got pole. He made an error in the race that left him with some damage to the floor. It perhaps wasn’t outright weak, as such, but it also wasn’t one of his better weekends.