Lando Norris: The 2025 Title Contenders

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Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the P1 podcast with Matt and Tommy.

Thanks for joining us for this third and final championship

Decider preview series,

where we've been talking about how we've got to a three-way fight

for the title on the final weekend of the season.

Make sure you scroll back in your podcast feed

to hear our episodes on Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri,

if you haven't already.

Today, we're here to talk about Lando Norris.

Let's head to Lando Norris.

The championship leader has seven race victories as well,

all three of them do.

The victories came in Australia, in Monaco, in Austin,

in the UK Silverstone, Hungary, Mexico, and Brazil.

He has 17 podiums to his name this season.

And Lando Norris should, in theory,

we should be talking about him being world champion right now.

If it wasn't for McLaren, we know that.

We've said that many times on the podcast already.

But Lando's season on the face of it

has not been the easiest for him.

He's had moments where he struggled with the car,

with the handling, whereas Oscar was thriving,

especially in that sort of from race, what would you say?

Well, as soon as Oscar went on that streak from Bahrain,

that was when Lando was just not able to get

on the same sort of form as Oscar.

Overall, he has put together a great campaign, for sure.

He's had three no-point scores,

of course, one being the disqualification,

the other two being Canada,

which was absolutely his fault,

and Zandvoort, which absolutely wasn't his fault.

I don't know how Lando, each week that McLaren let him down,

that he just resets.

What must be going through his head right now?

How does he have confidence going into the last race?

I don't know.

Yeah, it's crazy.

The season that Lando's had has been so bizarre, really.

You know, the story of his season has been

Lando essentially winning in Australia,

resisting the pressure from Max while Oscar went off

and thinking, oh, look, that's a really good drive from Lando.

Like, he can resist this pressure.

And then going into a run where, like, China Bahrain Saudi,

he was making mistakes and things,

like Bahrain, he made some errors.

Saudi crashed in qualifying,

where obviously Oscar won the race.

And there was obviously a lot of talk about, like,

can Lando actually do this?

He's feeling now, and it looked like Oscar was the top,

well, was the top McLaren driver.

And then, you know, it gets even worse in Canada

where he collides going for a move on his teammate.

And thankfully, well, not for him,

but thankfully for the team, he doesn't take Oscar out the race.

But then he does go on this, you know, great run.

And then it all goes wrong again in Zandvo,

and I think this is going to be really hard for him

to catch Oscar Piastri now in the same car.

Yeah, he falls behind in Canada, doesn't he?

And then we question, that was the moment.

I remember so many people jumping on, Oscar's going to be

world champion, he's going to do this, you know,

Lando's making too many mistakes, yada, yada, yada.

Lando then bounces back with a first, first, second, first,

just about puts him back in, like, contention with Oscar,

and then his engine fails.

Yeah, and in Zandvo, the crazy thing is after that,

obviously there's the contentious moment in Monza.

But we then went into Baku,

and of course all the headlines were that Oscar

had a really, really poor race,

but Lando was getting a lot of stick.

I guess quite rightly that he didn't make the opportunity,

he didn't take that opportunity of his title rival

because Max was out of it at this stage.

Bagging as many points as possible,

he was stuck behind other cars, he wasn't making moves.

And then he kind of went into this kind of phase

in the next couple of races where it was almost like this

silent, like, championship contender

where all the talk was, can Oscar hold on

or is Max going to win?

And we said, that's going to help Lando, I think, massively.

And since then, you know, he's been brilliant.

And I think, you know, his best moments,

it's just how consistent he has actually been.

Even those races where he gets stick

for like finishing second and it's not exciting

or he's not going for moves and stuff,

points when you're championships.

And I don't think it's on him that he's got the points

tell he's got because McLaren have absolutely

screwed him in the last year.

They screwed him, he'd be world champion right now,

which I'd like to remind people because

I feel it's, you know, quite unfair on Lando

that he's having to go all the way to the wire.

So many points with it.

Yeah, he has.

And McLaren better be getting him a serious Christmas present,

especially if he doesn't win this world championship somehow.

I would be gutted for Lando if that was the case.

Let's go to his best moment of the season.

What was the standout for Lando where we thought,

damn, he's got it.

For me, it's been towards the end of the year, for sure.

Brazil was fantastic from him.

It was such a difficult weekend.

You had horrible conditions, a place that craziness happens

and Lando could have easily succumbed to the pressure

of having to get this title across the line.

So Brazil is 100% a vote for me.

And then again, I kind of go all the way back to Australia

as well as a moment where he took it to Max Verstappen

and he won in the rain.

I remember there were some mistakes on the way to winning.

A few things we went, oh, maybe not.

But he won there and that was kind of a moment of, right,

Lando is here to play and he's here to take this

potential championship.

But I think if I'm going to choose one, it has to be Brazil.

I will go between, it's between Mexico and Brazil for me

because I think those are the most impressive victories

for me because as we mentioned,

he kind of quietly got under the radar

and he was still in that championship fight.

He didn't have the amazing form that Max did,

but he was taking points out of Oscar consistently

and had a lot more pace than Oscar.

And then he goes into Mexico and I think it's Mexico,

he got an amazing start,

which is something that's been his Achilles heel.

He didn't worry about,

he was a very, very difficult track to basically lead

from being on pole position into turn one.

Wins the raise from pole and now it looks like,

okay, he's looking very good.

Then you go into Brazil and yeah,

Brazil is such a strong moment

because there was all this talk of like,

it's raining, it's Brazil,

of course Max is going to win.

And actually, you know, he wins the sprint,

he wins the main race, takes pole position.

Absolutely brilliant form.

And after those two wins,

all he had to do was score few points

and he's been disqualified and finished fourth.

So, and that's of course, yeah,

the team errors that have cost him,

but realistically, Brazil should have been

that drive where it's like,

right, he's won the world championship now.

But unfortunately for his team, that's not in the case.

McLaren went now.

We won a title finale.

It's fun that way.

So, thank you McLaren again.

Let's go to worst moment of the year for Lando.

Tommy, what are you going to lock in?

There's a few, obviously we mentioned Baku.

The funny thing about Baku is that

if he wins the title by a few points,

these kind of non-risky moves where everyone said,

oh, he's not going for the moves, not doing it here.

And this is how a Formula One championship plays out,

doesn't it?

Like these moments where it's like,

oh, he missed out by a few points.

If he'd overtaken here, he would have done this

or he would have done that.

I think you've got to go back to Saudi,

the crash in qualifying.

Then he went into the race

and I think he spent a long time

unable to pass Charles Leclerc.

Meanwhile, his teammate is just romping home

for victory to make it, you know,

his third victory of the season.

And that was a really low moment for Lando,

I think, just from the fact that

his form had really dipped

after a brilliant win in Australia

and you thought, okay, he has turned it around.

And then went back into this kind of

error-prone driver again.

Obviously he's turned that around now.

But I think Saudi was probably, for me,

like the lowest where it's like,

oh, wow, Lando's like really struggling

with this car, he's not finding his groove.

And of course, at that stage,

Oscar was just flying.

So my moment for worst event

for Lando this year has to be Canada.

I think the movie pulled on Oscar

was really poor, crashes into the back

of his teammate, loses.

I think it was a P5,

I think it was P5 at the time.

So in terms of point swings,

that's 10 points just lost through

a fault that was completely on him.

It depends how you package it.

So that's my error, I would say,

of the year for Lando.

In terms of worst moment

that might not be his fault is Las Vegas.

He did everything he needed to do in Las Vegas

to have enough of a championship lead

going into the last two rounds.

On a track, they're not that good at either.

Taken away from him, exactly.

He did absolutely everything.

And to remove all those points

away from him due to a team error

is a disaster.

So that's from that side,

but in terms of something for Lando's performance

I would say Canada.

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Right.

What moment could be the thing

that costs him the title?

I feel like these can sometimes blur

the lines between worst moments of the year

and the thing that costs him the title

Las Vegas.

If Lando does not win the world championship

it is Las Vegas and it is Qatar.

Qatar is obviously a strategic

on the go

era from McLaren which I still

do not believe that they

thought it through at all.

Clearly they didn't because

they were the only team not to pit.

But Las Vegas

is such an

era where you got

obviously hindsight is a wonderful thing.

But why are they risking it anyway?

There's clearly been an oversight there

from McLaren and how they look

at the cars and all the telemetry

they get. They know the load

that is being put through the car.

They can see the cameras.

They can see the sparks.

Why are they risking

it at all?

Even if they finish fourth

and fifth, fifth and sixth

in Vegas and lose all the pace by running

the car a bit higher to not run

the risk of being disqualified it doesn't matter.

Lando has a much bigger

gap going into

the last two races.

So Las Vegas

will be my answer.

Yeah, there'll be people

the Lando Norris

crew of just hating

on him for every single reason

unfairly saying like

he lost points here, lost points there.

But realistically

say like Canada for example

but realistically

it's had the engine failure

where that's a McLaren failure on him

Vegas, the failure

by McLaren and then

Qatar again where he's finishing third

so it's not going to be a huge

points difference in Qatar

really but obviously it's still

a few points through a

McLaren blunder.

It's got to be the failure

in Zandvoort to have a mechanical failure

when you're running P2 is big in a championship fight.

And Vegas

because yeah, it has to be Vegas

if they lose this title

it's that is the

that will be if they lose this title

unless they do something again

in Abu Dhabi the

2007 Lewis Hamilton

kind of why have they left him out on

the canvas of his tyres

when all you had to do was cruise

home to a P5 and win the championship

and equally Lando had the championship

won at Brazil

and the only reason

that could have bought Max in is if he won

the race and he got a no score

and Lando finished second on the road at a track

that McLaren aren't particularly good at

drove a great race

brilliant pole position in the wet

and bagged 18 points

and then they were taken away through

an error so

yeah, I think

at the end of the day

Max of course like I want

Max to win

being a Max's up and fan shop

but what I just want to say

like it would be absolutely

devastating like for Lando to lose it

by another McLaren error again

because

you know, wherever your

allegiances lie

to have like

pretty much the title

won like same as like Lewis Hamilton

like 2007 and stuff and have that

title won to lose it

through no fault of your own

would be an absolute

you know, kicking the

nuts to say the least

like it would be awful

it would be awful, it would be

it would feel terrible for Lando

and that's not how

we want to see this championship play out

because I think it will leave

probably not for you a bitter taste Tommy

but it will in some ways

when you analyse the last few races

you'd feel like Lando was kind of robbed

of a championship that was going to be his

and he's lost it through no fault of his own

but fingers crossed, McLaren

saw it all out, they do a 1-2

for their sake, of course, not for entertainment's sake

and then

the championship isn't

questioned as to

who deserved it, who didn't deserve it

etc. although that conversation

unless Lando wins the title

by 5 points and then the Oscar

Piestre Mons the Switch will be

World War 3 in the media

as long as Oscar would have to finish

5 points behind

wouldn't he rather than

that's what I said, 5

you said to win by 5 but obviously from

Oscar Piestre as opposed to Max Verstappen

who is the closest competitor to Tommy

I know you're glass half empty mate

he is second in the championship

percentage if you can do maths

we'll find out if Tommy can

my likelihood for Lando Norris

winning the world championship in Abu Dhabi is 65%

the reason why it's no higher

than that is because I don't trust McLaren as far as I can throw them

right now and

if Lando has a working

team that does everything he needs

them to do in Abu Dhabi it probably

be up at 90% but this is

factoring in everything 65%

and mine is almost 90%

85% if I've done the maths correctly

5 plus 10 is 15

good stuff

look

it's in his hands still

and this is the only reason it's not 100%

it was in his hands in Vegas

in his hands in Qatar

and

it's changed completely of course

and

it can only really be

a McLaren

failure that could

do something to stop him winning this title

failure of the car or operationally

operationally because

the reason I think it's so low as well

is like

Abu Dhabi is a track where

you make an error you're just going off into the runoff

so it will take

something crazy

from McLaren

maybe or something for it to go wrong for Lando

because it's his best

one of his best

maybe even his best on the calendar

along with Austria

in terms of like

his performances there

and obviously he was brilliant there last year

won comfortably

and drove so well

so yeah

it's surely got to be Lando's

but this season has thrown so many curveballs

which is why it's not 100%

exactly Lando's results

at Abu Dhabi are

8th, 5th, 7th, 6th, 5th, 1st

of course

didn't have a championship winning car

for a lot of those times

but that is the

record he has

will he have another win to his name

he won't care as long as he wins the world championship

and that is it

thank you everybody for tuning in

to this little special bonus episode

chatting about the three

title protagonists

will it be Oscar Piastri

will it be Max Verstappen

who takes home the 2025

Formula One World Championship

Tommy, final thoughts

final thoughts, I just can't believe

we're in this situation with

three drivers winning the title

thank god

sorry, being in the title

my brain is

they've all won it

just take it all they can have a third of the trophy each

that's what McLaren would like wouldn't they really

just give it to both their drivers

and they don't have to have a worry

they want Max to have it

give it to Max so that neither of them have anything

then that is fair that is fair, yeah true

okay, yeah, come on Max

come on McLaren

there's one more in here

thank you everybody for joining us

across these three episodes

we'll be back with the final

predictions episode of the season

another championship battle

that has somehow gone right down to the wire

see you then

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