Without a victory since the season-opener in Australia, Lando Norris had some ground to make up at race four in Bahrain. After an under-par qualifying, he recovered from sixth on the grid and a false start to ultimately finish on the podium in third. Yet despite teammate Oscar Piastri claiming his second win of 2025, the Briton extended his lead at the top of the drivers’ standings from one point to three points.
“Everyone says I’m leading the championship, I don’t know how at the minute, I’m pretty surprised,” Norris said. It wasn’t his first self-deprecating quote of the weekend; it likely won’t be his last of the season.
It was a theme, starting in Spain last June, which persevered throughout Norris’s inaugural title tilt up against Max Verstappen in 2024. Despite his obvious skill behind the wheel, Norris would often present a figure of self-doubt, constantly questioning his abilities, particularly up against one of the modern greats in the Dutchman.
“I am not doubting myself, even though sometimes it might seem like that,” Norris said, in more depth, after Sunday’s race.
“I know what I can do and what I am capable of and I am not even close to reaching that like yesterday – I am very disappointed in myself. That’s just the way I am, I am just so hungry to win.
“Doing interviews and saying things I do, I don’t think necessarily has a bad impact on myself. I have learnt to block my own comments away from my thoughts, maybe sometimes I lack a bit of self-belief but that is also me, the way I do things.”
In many ways, Norris is correct to state he should do it his own way. Why change one’s mentality when you’re on the cusp of the peak of your profession? Why alter anything which has got you to this point in your career? Yet world champions, even if they don’t believe it, have a tendency to present an aura of invincibility. And that is something the ultra-composed Piastri – both on and off the track – has in abundance in just his third season in the sport.
On the face of it, if it wasn’t for Piastri’s misadventure into the grass amid the rain in Melbourne, the ...
