“We’ve been on a good progression rate,” Lando Norris believes McLaren has the potential to return to winning ways in a couple of years’ time
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Lando Norris
McLaren have had a disappointing couple of years. From 2012 through to 2021, they did not a win single race in Formula 1, and they had to drive in the lower rungs of the midfield for a few years as well, before they gradually made a comeback, finishing 3rd in 2020, and 4th in 2021, after a nail-biting fight with Ferrari.
McLaren did not win a race for 8 seasons, and their ‘disappointing’ run goes way back. Their last Driver’s title was back in 2008 when Lewis Hamilton just beat out Felipe Massa, but their last constructor championship was in 1998, in the days of Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard.
McLaren have a huge fanbase in Formula 1, but their results for a long time have been rather disappointing, considering the fact that they are a massive institution – around the same level as Ferrari. And while Ferrari have bounced back (even though it is a bumpy road), McLaren have rather taken a step down from 2021. But Lando Norris believes their fortunes may be in for an upturn before the advent of the new regulations.
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Lando Norris: ‘I didn’t sign up with McLaren this year to immediately win races’
Apart from the top three teams, there has only been one podium finish for the others – when Lando Norris finished 3rd in Imola. But even that was to some extent down to Charles Leclerc’s spin, and Carlos Sainz’s early retirement. Of course, for this, you cannot take anything away from Norris, he was faultless.
Norris admitted that the team had high hopes for the start of the season – but they did not materialize: “This year, we obviously got our hopes up. Like, we’ve been on a good progression rate – the team’s in a very good position with personnel and people and we under-delivered on what we needed. So we started the year in a much trickier position than what we should have done.”
McLaren have not been up to their standards in 2022, but they have mostly been on the up since the first race, which was a very low point for them. Lando Norris sits alone as the ‘best of the rest’ right now. In their early situation, some questioned the wisdom of Lando Norris’ decision to extend with McLaren, but Norris has shut them down, as he still believes he can win with McLaren.
In an interview with RaceFans, he said: “No, no, no, no. I still believe. I didn’t sign up to be with McLaren for this year like ‘this year I’m going to be winning races’ – that was far from my belief.”
He thinks that 2024-25 are when McLaren can expect to be winning races or competing for victories: “I still knew it would take a good few years – 2024-25 will be the first time when there should be less and less excuses in a way to go ‘why aren’t we in a position we should be in?’”
Lando Norris conceded that he has been frustrated at times – especially at the beginning of the year. But there have been highs – like the podium in Imola (which he earlier said blew his mind, and that he still doesn’t understand how it happened) and they remind him that there’s still hope. He concluded by saying that he is here to win races – in two or three years.
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