Winner of the Newcomer of the Year award at the 2026 Laureus World Sports Awards, Lando Norris reinforced that he does not intend to give up the fight for the title of Formula 1even after a start to the season below McLaren’s expectations. The Brit adopts a speech of confidence in the team’s reaction and sees room for growth throughout the championship.
Currently in fifth place in the Drivers’ World Championship, Norris has 25 points and is 47 behind leader Kimi Antonelli, from , who has been the main highlight of the season so far. A also figures among the forces at the front.
Despite the scenario, Norris rejects any change of focus for 2027 and maintains that the championship remains open. “I think we can have a good season, even if we’re not where we want to be right now. Even though we didn’t start the year where we want to, we still want to fight for the championship. This isn’t a case of giving up and focusing on next year, I’m not even sure if that approach ever works,” he said.
The pilot also uses recent examples to justify the optimism within the company. “There are several examples where we weren’t exactly where we wanted to be at the beginning of the year, but we ended up in a much stronger position at the end; 2023, 2024 and so on. And we are a much stronger team than we were before. We’ve been like this, we’ve done it, we’ve learned from it. I trust this team can do it again. There’s a lot of hard work ahead, but we’re ready for it,” he added.
Norris also recognized that below-expected performance is due to factors beyond the pure performance of the car. According to him, problems during the first stages compromised the team’s development and adaptation.
“We’re not in a terrible position, but we definitely have to work to get back to competing for wins. And yet, we have to continue to ensure we have a car capable of winning every weekend,” he said.
Finally, the Brit detailed some of the difficulties faced at the start of the championship. “We also had some problems that didn’t really help our development of these cars. One thing we understood very early on is that time in the car is very important to learning how to get the most out of it, especially from the engine. Very, very small margins make a significant difference. Combine that with the fact that we didn’t start in China and that we didn’t have enough track time during practice in Japan, it’s easy to see where we are behind,” he concluded.
Norris and McLaren’s next commitment will be on May 3rd, with the .
