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Motorsport

Lando Norris explains how he turned around his season to become F1 2025 title favourite

Lando Norris Oscar Piastri F1 McLaren Zandvoort

It all seemed doom-and-gloom on the 31 August. An oil leak had just put Lando Norris out of the Dutch Grand Prix meaning the McLaren Formula 1 driver was now 34 points behind Oscar Piastri, who won at Zandvoort, in the championship.

The outcome of the 2025 title therefore seemed inevitable. Piastri was the driver in form, he’d just scored his seventh win of the year after five podiums on the bounce and was driving as good as ever with many wondering ‘how on earth could he let this opportunity slip’.

It was quite remarkable really, given Norris’ superiority over his team-mate in their previous two years together. But when it truly mattered, in 2025 with a world title at stake, the Briton just couldn’t quite piece things together having already reported struggles with the dominant MCL39.

Norris likes to brake late and open up corner entries whereas his car got more out of being almost passive into turns to prioritise the exit. The result was Norris biding his way into the year, whereas Piastri came out flying with four wins in the opening six compared to just one victory for his team-mate.

“It’s hard not to do a better job than what I was doing at the beginning of the season - I certainly struggled,” stated Norris.

But those comments were made in the context of a now completely different situation.

Lando Norris, McLaren, Oscar Piastri, McLaren (Photo by: Joe Portlock / LAT Images via Getty Images)

Piastri has failed to win since Zandvoort, even scoring just one podium, while Norris has beaten him in every one of the six grands prix in that period, including taking two wins. Norris therefore leads the championship by 24 points with just three rounds remaining ahead of Las Vegas this weekend and only now does it seem safe to say that the title outcome appears very likely.

“The result of where I am now is from a mental side,” added Norris in Vegas. “I'm in this position because of the beginning of the season, like, I'm almost happier that I had a pretty crappy beginning of the year.

“Those difficult times certainly allowed me to be a little bit more positive about myself, allowed me to focus and I started to do a lot more work on all of those things to improve them, which has led me to be in this much stronger position.”

The 26-year-old has often been pretty open about the mental side of professional sport since making his F1 debut in 2019. He once said the pressures of being a rookie at 19 “often took its toll on me” and how being open about such topics can actually benefit others.

Even this year, Norris said he sometimes doubted himself at the start of the campaign and that “he cared too much” about what people said across the opening rounds. So that’s one area Norris knew he needed to work on and gradual improvements mean the 11-time grand prix victor doesn’t actually see Zandvoort as the ultimate turning point in this title fight.

“Even if you go back to my post-race interviews in Zandvoort, I was pretty upbeat, not upbeat or like happy with what happened, but for the position I'm in, fighting for the world championship, I wasn't too deflated about the situation,” he said.

“I was obviously gutted and not happy, but it wasn't like I came in and I was just deflated about everything. The race pace was still reasonably strong, so I think it was prior to that. Everyone refers to Zandvoort as being that moment that turned things around - already prior to Zandvoort I think I started to be on the right track.

Lando Norris, McLaren, Oscar Piastri, McLaren (Photo by: Clive Rose / Getty Images)

“That was just a big step back in terms of positioning. The change had already started by that point. So I think by the time we got Zandvoort out the way, it gave me a bit more time to refocus.”

Norris also acknowledged “the good group of people” around him, which has allowed the championship leader to act more positively given an old trait of his was being extremely self-critical after a track session.

But the off-track work can’t receive all the credit for his turnaround, given some beneficial changes were made to his car such as a new suspension in Canada. So it is a combination of many things that’s saved Norris’ campaign, yet he’s fully aware the championship picture “can also just change very quickly” as recent rounds have shown.

But even if Piastri was to win every grand prix until the end and Norris finish second in each, the Briton is still champion.

That strikes a resemblance of 2016 when Nico Rosberg faced a similar situation. So being the calculated man he is, the German played the percentage game by aiming for second across the final four races to eventually beat his Mercedes rival Lewis Hamilton.

When asked if he will try something similar, Norris said: “What's done me so well the last few weekends is by going flat[out], staying out of trouble, staying out of the chaos behind. It's almost a safer bet in terms of pushing.

“So I think it's not the right mindset to have. I come here this weekend to try and win. I'll go to Qatar to try and win. I still treat it as if I'm not in a championship. I'm just here to try and win this weekend and that's the mentality I'll have over the next few weeks. Nothing changes because of whatever points I've got.”