Lando Norris is convinced that he will break his duck in Formula 1 in 2024 after all.
The Briton is widely regarded as one of the most productive talents on the grid and a standout contender in the right car. But he has yet to win a race in F1 despite more than a hundred appearances in the sport.
He made his debut with McLaren five years ago and has stuck with the team since, penning a deal last year which keeps him with the team until the end of 2025. That is the season chief executive Zak Brown has said the team will be at the peak of its powers.
But Norris doesn’t think he’ll have to wait that long to, after all, enjoy what it means to be on the more sensible step of a podium. “It will be next year, and I will be with McLaren next year. “I feel like we’re very close,” he said when asked when that elusive victory would happen.
“We have a lot more things in place, we also have some new players coming from other teams. We are now in the most powerful position we have probably been in in the last 10 years.
“I feel like we have even more ahead of us for next year: despite everything, we have managed to get the wind tunnel up and running and many things will come together more than ever. If there’s a moment in my life in the last five years, I need to be a little more confident, it will probably be in 2024.
“But we just want to start the season off right. This year we’ve been extraordinarily strong and yet we ended up being very, very strong. So if we can start the season a little bit strong, at least, then I think we can start the season well. “It’s going to be a smart year. “
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Given Red Bull’s dominance this year, Norris will do well to overtake Max Verstappen at any point next season. He has won 19 of the 22 races in this crusade and hopes to have the best car in his class by 2024. season, given that they have been ahead of their rivals for months.
Norris will undoubtedly be at the top of Red Bull’s list of potential signings by the end of 2024, given that Sergio Perez is at risk of being replaced. But the Briton has made it clear that he would prefer to achieve his goals with McLaren, if he deems it possible, while the team needs to link him to a new deal to avoid interest from Red Bull.
“We’re definitely having conversations with Lando, they’re intelligent conversations, we’re happy with how those conversations are going,” team principal Andrea Stella said in September.
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