Lando Norris accused Max Verstappen of “talking nonsense” after claiming he would have already won the 2025 Formula 1 title had his car been as dominant as the McLaren.
The Red Bull driver is third in the championship, three points behind second-placed Oscar Piastri and 25 off leader Lando Norris with the Qatar and Abu Dhabi grands prix left to play.
Verstappen has been widely regarded as the best driver this year, given that he is still in the title conversation considering the dominance of the McLaren pair across most of the season.
But upgrades for round 16 at Monza transformed Red Bull’s season and four wins in seven, plus various incidents for McLaren like a double disqualification in Vegas, has allowed Verstappen to cut a points deficit that stood at 104 heading into September’s Italian Grand Prix.
It led to the four-time world champion telling F1 TV “if we would have been in the position of how dominant of a car they [McLaren] had, let’s say like that, the championship would have been over a long time ago”.
Yet Norris strongly rebuffed that claim after finishing third in the Qatar GP sprint, as he said: “This is Red Bull’s way of going about things - this aggressive nature, just talking nonsense a lot of the time.
“So, it depends if you want to listen to it and talk about it, like you love to, or you do what we do as a team, which is just keep our heads down, keep focused. Maybe he would have done, but he hasn’t so far and he keeps trying.”
Despite the strong use of words, Norris did also credit Verstappen for what he has achieved in F1 since making his debut at the 2015 Australian Grand Prix.
The 28-year-old is vying for his fifth, consecutive title - a feat only achieved by Michael Schumacher - and broke several records when he had the dominant car during the early ground-effect era.
In the 2023 season, for example, Verstappen won a record-breaking 19 grands prix, which included 10 consecutive victories, and scored an unprecedented 575 points.
“Max can say whatever he wants to be honest,” said Norris, who can seal his maiden title in Qatar this weekend. “He’s kind of earned the right, he’s won four world championships, I’ve a lot of respect and I think that that gives anyone a lot of credit.
“He’s achieved an incredible amount, more than anyone generally dreams of achieving, so Max generally has a good clue about a lot of things, but there’s also a lot of things he doesn’t have much of a clue about.”
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