The demons of Russia 2021 have finally been conquered.
Lando Norris, in his 110th race for McLaren, has finally secured his maiden Formula 1 victory, defying the odds to win the 2024 Miami Grand Prix.
Before Sunday’s race, the British driver held the unwanted record for most F1 podiums without a victory, placing second or third on 15 occasions since his debut in 2019.
However, courtesy of a fortuitous Safety Car that gifted Norris the lead in the 29th lap, the drought was finally broken in Miami.
“About time,” Norris said after the race.
“It’s been a long time coming, but finally I’ve been able to do it.
“I’m so happy for my whole team. I finally delivered for them.
“Finally on top, so I’m over the moon.
“A lot of people doubted me along the way, I’ve made a lot of mistakes over my last five years.”
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Norris’ triumph comes three years and 58 races after the infamous Sochi blunder, where the McLaren driver refused to change to wet tyres in the latter stages of race, sliding off the track and denying himself a maiden F1 victory.
“I feel like we can put Russia 2021 behind us now,” Will Joseph, Norris’ race engineer, told Sky Sports after the race.
“Everyone at McLaren does a fantastic job. The team foundation is so strong right now, Andrea’s leadership is phenomenal and we just go from strength to strength.
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella continued: “(Lando) deserves it so much. We have always said, as soon as we give him the right material, he will make it and he made it.
“I know what kind of work is behind this. It’s so deserved for the McLaren team. I hope everyone enjoys this moment.”
Big Sargeant collision gifts Norris lead | 01:14
Meanwhile, Norris relished the opportunity to silence the social media critics that dubbed him “Lando NoWins”.
“I am happy to put that to bed and prove a lot of these people wrong,” he said during the post-race press conference.
“I love it to go on Instagram and like all the comments from people abusing me, I freaking love it, makes me smile more than anything, especially ‘Lando NoWins’, that’s become the thing.”
“For me to prove those people wrong and prove (to) the people who didn’t think I could go out and do it, it’s going to be an even bigger smile on my face today, so I thank all of them.”
‘HE WAS FLYING’: MCLAREN PACE TURNS HEADS
It can’t be denied that Norris’ upgraded MCL38 showed plenty of promise at the Miami Grand Prix.
McLaren added ten different upgrades to the British driver’s car ahead of this weekend, with the changes paying dividends in Sunday’s race.
When the Safety Car ended on the 33rd lap, Norris successfully kept Red Bull’s Max Verstappen out of DRS range and crossed the finish seven seconds ahead of the three-time world champion.
“Once we made a pit stop I heard what the lap times McLaren were doing and I was like, ‘Well, that’s pretty quick,’” Verstappen confessed after the race.
“Once they switched onto the hard tyre, they just had more pace, and especially Lando, he was flying.
“It was incredibly difficult for us on that stint.”
However, Red Bull later revealed that Verstappen had sustained some minor damage to the underside of his car after hitting a bollard on the 23rd lap.
When asked whether McLaren was showing its true pace following the raft of car updates, Verstappen responded: “I hope not!
“They came with an upgrade, for sure it looks like it works so we have a bit of work to do from our side.
“I think definitely it wasn’t our strongest weekend in terms of race pace, but we’ll analyse it all and we’ll try to come back stronger.”
It’s impossible to predict where Norris would have finished if not for the collision between Haas’ Kevin Magnussen and Williams’ Logan Sargeant, but early signs suggest McLaren might continue fighting with Ferrari for podiums over the coming months, and has closed the gap to the top.
The Woking-based team still won’t be rivalling the mighty Red Bulls on a regulary basis anytime soon, but the champions and Mercedes will be wary of the papaya car’s improvement.
The gap between Ferrari and McLaren has closed to 63 points on the constructors’ standings, with a potential battle for second looming on the horizon.
“I stuck with McLaren because I believed in them,” Norris continued.
“Today proved exactly that.”
Piastri, who was on track for a podium finish in Miami before the Safety Car, also stands to benefit once the full suite of upgrades filters to his car in Imola.
RICCIARDO’S ‘PROBLEM’ AFTER TEAMMATE’S SOLID RACE
There wasn’t much that Daniel Ricciardo could have achieved during Sunday’s race having started in last place on the grid.
The Australian, who was knocked out in Q1 during Saturday’s qualifying session, had already copped a three-place grid penalty for a Safety Car breach during last month’s Chinese Grand Prix.
After getting stuck in traffic, Ricciardo crossed the line in 15th, while RB teammate Yuki Tsunoda finished seventh in front of Mercedes’ George Russell.
“Entering the race you always have some optimism, but yesterday’s quali hurt,” Ricciardo explained after the race.
“We were stuck in traffic in the race and were simply not quick enough to come through the field.
“We struggled a lot to use our pace compared to what we did yesterday in the Sprint with the clean air.
“We’ll definitely be looking into it in our debrief, but generally, we know that we have to qualify better, like I did on Friday.
“Taking the positives, the team leaves Miami very happy; I had a good Sprint Qualifying and Sprint in the previous days, and Yuki also got some points today.”
Dan froths at finish: “Let’s f***ing go” | 00:35
After a difficult start to his 2024 campaign, Ricciardo bounced back during Saturday’s Sprint by finishing fourth to secure five valuable points. However, according to former world champion Jenson Button, the Perth driver’s impressive Sprint has been overshadowed by another disappointing race, where he was once again outperformed by his teammate.
“The problem for him is that he’ll be looking at where his teammate finished,” Button said on Sky Sports.
“That’s the battle at the moment, between him and his teammate.
“People forget that, they’ll remember the results, and that’s the problem.
“It’s about him picking himself up after this and getting a great result.
“That’s the battle that’s important for him right now, for his future in the sport.”
Former IndyCar driver Danica Patrick continued: “You’re only as good as your last race.
“He’s going to be down and he’s going to wish it could have been different.
“I hope he remembers that he had an incredible Saturday.”
Aussies go head-to-head in final laps! | 00:54
TRUMP IS NORRIS’ ‘LUCKY CHARM’
Norris has revealed that Donald Trump joked he was the British driver’s “lucky charm” after the former US President visited the McLaren team before Sunday’s race.
Trump, the Republican 2024 presidential candidate, arrived at Hard Rock Stadium before the race and visited the McLaren garage where he met with chief executive Zak Brown and then sought out Norris after the race.
“I didn’t see him in the garage to be honest, I was busy prepping for the race, but he saw me after, and he came up to congratulate me,” Norris explained.
“I guess it’s an honour, because whenever you have someone like this, it has to be an honour for them to come up to you, to take time out of their life, to pay their respect for what you’ve done.
“He said he was my lucky charm, because it’s my win, so I don’t know if he’s going to come to more races now.”
Norris said he appreciated Trump’s words from their post-race exchange.
“There’s a lot of special people, or cool people that have been here this weekend,” Norris continued.
“Donald is someone that you’ve got to have a lot of respect for in many ways, and for anyone like that, who acknowledges what you can go out and do, and acknowledges the work ethic that goes into things, you’ve got to be thankful for that, and I was.
“So yeah, a cool moment.”
After Trump’s visit to the McLaren’s garage, which drew a large crowd of onlookers, the team issued a statement.
“McLaren is a non-political organisation however we recognise and respect the office of President of the United States so when the request was made to visit our garage on race day we accepted alongside the president of the FIA and the CEOs of Liberty Media and Formula 1,” the team said.
“We were honoured that McLaren Racing was chosen as the representative of F1 which gave us the opportunity to showcase the world class engineering that we bring to motorsport.”