Lando Norris “ready to bring the fight to everyone” in F1 2025
McLaren's Lando Norris has talked up his F1 title chances heading into the 2025 season.
Lando Norris has declared he is “ready to bring the fight to everyone” as he looks to win a first F1 world title in 2025.
The McLaren driver came up short in the 2024 world championship and finished 63 points behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who wrapped up his fourth successive title with two rounds to spare.
After enjoying his strongest F1 campaign to date, and helping McLaren regain the constructors’ world title, the 25-year-old Briton, who claimed four wins and eight pole positions, is determined to go one better this season.
"When that realisation kind of sets in of 'it's gone', it's a tough one," Norris told the BBC podcast F1: Back at Base.
"This is what I've done since I was a kid, this is all I want to do. So, as soon as that kind of candle is gone and it's over, it hurts.
"It's been a year where, actually, I've been pretty proud of my performance. Proud of performing under the pressure that we've been under, delivering when I have.
"I've made my mistakes and, at the same time, I've learned a lot from those mistakes.
"So for us to go into next year, going 'we have what it takes, we have a car'... I believe I'm a good enough driver and I've got everything it takes.
"I'm excited to go into 2025 knowing I've learned a lot, I've improved a lot and I'm ready to bring the fight to everyone.
"Confidence is something I've struggled with in the past and probably I've only built enough up throughout this season to go 'I'm confident that I'm a good enough driver to win a championship next year' and I can bring a fight to whoever wants to fight me for it.”
McLaren must ‘raise the bar’ in 2025
Despite winning the constructors’ championship for the first time since 1998 and ending the season with the fastest car, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella stressed his side cannot get complacent.
"It will be incredibly naive to think that because we achieved the constructor championship, now we deserve it for the future," Stella told the same podcast.
"Something that you have to deserve by doing a good job and, in a way, by doing a better job than you have done in 2024, and it was important to discuss the many opportunities we have to do better.
"We have achieved the 2024 constructors' championship, but the performance advantage we had was 0.04% on average, and the points margin we had was 2%.
“Over 666 points in a season, these margins simply mean that if you don't do better next year, then you have to be ready to face a loss.
“We don't want to face a loss. We want to continue winning, therefore, we need to raise the bar for the future."
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