Lando Norris knows Max Verstappen will “push the boundaries” to win again this year, but insists he is ready for the Dutchman’s dark arts.
The Brit finished a career-best second in the standings last year but still some 63 points adrift of Verstappen, 27. Their title fight created several flashpoints including a collision in Austria which ended both their chances of victory and a furious skirmish in Mexico which saw the Red Bull racer handed 20 seconds’ worth of penalties.
Norris, 25, kept it clean despite those regular run-ins but that led to critics labelling him too meek. As he heads into this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix and the new F1 championship as favourite to win both, the McLaren racer admits he “clearly wasn’t ready” to beat Verstappen on track last term. But now he’s had a taste of how the four-time champion operates, he has confidently declared himself fully prepared for the fight.
Norris said: “I do think Max will be the hardest guy to race against. He’s always going to be the one who’s going to be most willing to push the limits and push the boundaries like he did. So I learned that aspect of Max. I learned where I stood in that situation, which was not at the right level. I learned from those things. I’m just excited to have another crack at it and see what I can do.”
McLaren’s teams’ championship win last December and their strong pace in testing have cemented Norris as the bookies favourite for glory this year. Few would rush to rule out Verstappen who is gunning for five titles in a row, a feat managed only once before by Michael Schumacher during his Ferrari heyday.
But Red Bull expect to start the season off the pace and the Dutchman has been critical of his new car which left him demanding “more speed” yesterday. Though McLaren will be strong in the early stages, Norris says he is not convinced the balance of power will remain the same over the course of another long 24-race campaign.
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And he is critical of those in the sport who he feels are ramping up the expectation on him and his team. He said: “I’m quite surprised so many people are so short-sighted… Everyone just wants to play that game of looking like the underdog and playing it down.”
If McLaren are indeed in a class of their own, then Norris’ main rival will be Oscar Piastri. The Aussie, entering his third season in F1, is riding high on the back of a £20million-per-year contract extension and Norris says he would welcome a title battle with his team-mate.
He said: “We’re happy to go against each other and compete. Of course, we have to know that we’re going to be against each other a lot this season, and I hope we are.
“But our strength last season was helping one another and always giving each other a good amount of room, racing fair, those kinds of things. We need to maintain that – that’s one of our biggest things as a team and our biggest goal.”
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