After a decade + of Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen taking the title, the Formula One championship had sort of lost its luster for me. It was like the Patriots winning the Superbowl again. (No offense Tom Brady.) This season was different. Red Bull was in chaos. McLaren had a car. My driver had a chance.
My driver is Lando Norris. I’ve followed Lando since he arrived on the scene in 2019. Everyone was watching what Zak Brown was doing and whether his choices would turn McLaren around. He laid his bets on Lando and Carlos Sainz Jr., who would end up forming a bromance for the ages, #CarLando4Ever, and still represent paddock goals. Both drivers helped advance the development of the car and pave the way for both the constructor’s and driver’s championship campaign.
Lando may be this generation’s Sebastien Vettel; a kind and relatable person who has defied the expectations of how a competitive driver should behave. He admits his mistakes and apologizes, he openly discusses his mental health, wears his heart on his sleeve, and has often been vulnerable with the press discussing his missteps. Even in the most challenging times, he keeps smiling, shakes hands with his competitors, and leaves it all on the track. He is far from the cut-throat, emotionless driver everyone expects to be a champion; he’s a nice guy.
That doesn’t mean he’s not a scrappy and strategic driver. He’s just the guy you didn’t see coming. Lando will send it without fear and try to squeeze into the most narrow spaces on the track. That has been both a benefit and a burden to him this season, when some of his efforts cost him valuable points in what was a tight race between him and his McLaren teammate, Oscar Piastri. Oscar had the same car and the same support system, but is a much more controlled and less emotional driver. Oscar’s been the tortoise to Lando’s hare. It would turn out to be a race to the finish.
Lando took the championship lead out of the gate with a win at Melbourne. Oscar won the 2nd round when Lando had brake issues in Shanghai. Max got in front of both of them at Suzuka, but with a win at Bahrain, Oscar took the lead from Lando. LandoLand was not happy. This was not Oscar’s championship to take. He hadn’t earned it. Lando had spent years developing the car and helping build the team. This championship could not be Oscar’s. Next year would reset with the new car and development and Lando would have to start all over again.
I watched every race that Oscar won with a sense of begrudgery; watching Lando slip behind from a mixture of Papaya Rules and bad luck. Some of Lando’s post-race interviews was heartbreaking. He was living what we were watching and had to be way worse on the inside.
Oscar went on to win Saudi Arabia and Miami. He finished P2 to Lando’s P3 at Emilia Romagna. Things were low in the Norris camp. And then there was Monaco. Historically a race won by the polesitter, as it’s almost impossible to pass, qualifying meant everything. Lando pulled off P1in qualifying for the race and would go on to win. It wasn’t a lead change, but it was MONACO. It was enough to lift the spirits of LandoLand and get back to the charge.
It went on, back and forth, throughout the season. P1 for Oscar in Spain. DNF for Lando at Montreal. Lando won Austria and took his home race at Silverstone. P1 for Oscar at the Hungaroring. P1 Oscar at Zandvoort. Then something happened to Oscar. He wouldn’t win another race for the remainder of the season. Race by race, Lando was clawing back the points he lost from the Canadian DNF. At Mexico City, he got the lead back, thanks in part to Ollie Bearman who defended against Oscar for more than half the race, keeping him far enough behind in points for Lando to get ahead.
Lando won Brazil and had enough of a lead to breathe a little. He was some 24 points ahead of Oscar. They finished P2 Lando and P5 Oscar at Vegas and Lando’s lead grew. Then there was the DQ. Both McLarens were disqualified from the Las Vegas Grand Prix for excessive wear on their skid plates. Gut wrenching. All points lost. And all of the sudden, Max has a chance to win the championship. I haven’t mentioned Max much because he was over 100 points behind the McLaren drivers and seemed an outlier. But, he is Max Verstappen, 4-time world champion with nothing to lose, and amid all of the Papaya mayhem, had managed to get within 12 points of the lead. Lando was being outflanked on all sides.
Qatar was hard to watch. Lando needed 2 points above Oscar and Max to win the championship at Lusail. Oscar started P1 with Lando at P2 and Max at P3. We needed a flawless race and a Piastri error to pull it off. The race was lost by lap 7, when McLaren made a bad strategy call and didn’t box either car under the safety car, while every other team went in. At that point, they were 10 seconds behind no matter what. As a result, Max won, and set us up for a 3-way challenge at the final race.
The permutations for each driver to win saturated social media. Lando had to be on the podium to win the championship at Abu Dhabi. If either Max or Oscar won and Lando was P4 or below, the winner would win the championship. Max took pole with Lando P2 and Oscar P3. This was doable, but there was no room for error. The Mclaren plan was to give Oscar the best chance to win the race and to be in position to aid Lando, if needed. That played out in a gusty – and risky- overtake in lap1 at turn 9, putting Oscar in P2.
At this point we were 2 glasses into our mimosas at 8 am and on the edge of our seats. We had 5 devices running cams from all 3 drivers and both the F1TV feed and Sky Sports. As if there wasn’t enough chaos in the race, we had driver radios and commentators coming from all directions.
I can recall thinking, just don’t F it up. Be Careful. Charles is too close. Keep away from Lance Stroll. Get past Yuki. Lando did get past Yuki Tsunoda, but went over the track limits when Yuki weaved left and it went to the stewards for review. A possible 5-second penalty loomed over about 5 laps, until they came back in favor of Lando and gave the penalty to Yuki. It was a clean race other than that, with no real heroes or villains. Most yielded to the championship leaders and let them race.
When Lando was about halfway through the final lap, it started to sink in. He was going to do it. Lando Norris was going to win the Formula One World Championship. One would think we would be jumping for joy and making a huge scene, but that wasn’t the case. We were quietly teary-eyed hearing Lando and his engineer, Will Joseph, crying on the team radio. There was relief and pride and a sense of fulfillment that he was taking a title that was so challenging to earn. It was a culmination of a lifetime of work and commitment and sacrifice, and they hadn’t taken it from him. There were hugs and high fives eventually, then more crying.
I’ve watched dozens of championships won – dozens of Olympic medals, Lombardi trophies, and Stanley Cups awarded. These are the big moments in sport. These are moments that happen to other people. This was different. With the new generation of drivers and their openness on social media, we’ve experienced the season’s challenges an triumphs as the happened and feel like we’re part of the global support team. Our Driver won this. Our team won this. WE WON the Formula One World Championship.
