Lando Norris says he will take increased self-belief from this season into the Formula 1 drivers’ championship fight in 2025.
McLaren won the constructors’ championship as a result of Norris’ victory in the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, but Norris himself fell out of title contention for the drivers’ crown in Las Vegas two races earlier. With Max Verstappen securing a fourth straight championship, Norris says he has learned in 2024 that he has the tools to win a title and is motivated by the idea of being able to set such a target from the start of next season.
“I think the one thing I’ve learned this year is probably to believe in myself a bit more,” Norris said. “I’ve certainly not come out on top as often as I would have liked in certain moments as a driver, especially in my fights against Max.
“As much as it hurts sometimes, I’m probably happy about it now that I’m going to go into next season knowing that I can fight. And I know myself –more and better than anyone — what I need to improve on, where I’m not strong enough, where I’m strong enough.
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“I’m always open for criticism, things like that, but I’m the one who knows better than the others, right? So not in an arrogant way or a selfish way, but I know that I have to improve in a lot of areas and certain things.
“I feel like I’ve already done that quite a lot in the last three, four, five races. I feel like I’ve delivered some very strong results. But on the whole, next year is hopefully a year where I can go in and decide before the first race we’re going to fight for a championship. We’ve not ever thought of that.
“We’ve not even had the feeling of it from a team perspective and also for me as a driver. So hopefully next year is that year. We obviously have a lot of work to do — Ferrari are going to be pushing a lot.”
Norris provided a message on team radio after winning in Abu Dhabi, saying, “Next year is going to be my year too” and he says the confidence he has taken from 2024 leads him to believe he can deliver on that claim.
“I fancied it already this year but it was just a little too late,” he said. “I definitely have had things to improve on and to look back on and to try and correct and to improve, but nevertheless I think the thing that I’ve learned and gained the most this year is confidence in myself.
“It sounds very simple, I’ve just always been quite the opposite kind of guy — I need to go out and prove it to myself before I want to start believing anything. This year I’ve learned that. Yeah, I made some mistakes and I didn’t give a good-enough fight to Max, but it was a good effort and the one thing I’ve learned from it is I have what it takes.
“That’s not an overconfident saying. That’s ‘I know I made my mistakes, I know what I’m capable of doing, and I know if I can improve on these things it’s definitely possible.’ So I’m excited. As much as I want this season now to end and to go and have a holiday, I’m also already looking forward to next year.”