F1 star Lando Norris believes McLaren is set to have a strong 2024 season. The team finished fourth in the 2023 Constructors standings with 302 points, 205 of which were earned by the 24-year-old.
McLaren was immediately put on the back foot after failing to score a single point in the first two races of the year. But Norris steadily improved and was world champion Max Verstappen’s most consistent challenger during the second half of the campaign.
After ending the season in a far better position than in which he began, Norris thinks McLaren can take this momentum into the 2024 season. “I hate ever being confident or overconfident about things, I’m never that kind of guy,” he told Sky Sports F1 when asked if McLaren is set for a big year. “But I think so, because of what we have.
“We have a lot more things in place, of course, we’ve got a few new guys who are starting as well, coming from other teams. But now we’re in the strongest place we’ve been for probably the last 10 years, I feel like we’ve got more things to look forward to next year – we’ve finally got the wind tunnel properly going and so many things which are coming together more than ever.
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“If there’s ever a time in my life, over the last five years, I want to be a bit more confident, it’s probably going into 2024.” Norris claimed seven podium finishes in 2023 and ended the season just one point beyond fourth place Fernando Alonso in the Drivers’ Championship.
One of the British star’s goals for the upcoming campaign is to claim his first F1 race win. Some have given him the unwanted moniker of being the most talented driver on the grid who has yet to take the chequered flag.
Norris missed out on claiming pole position several times in qualifying in 2023, and he looked visibly frustrated as he tries to join the elite club of F1 race winners. Asked whether his first win will come with McLaren, Norris said: “100 percent, yeah. Because it’s going to be next year, and I’m with McLaren next year. I feel like we’re so close.
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“There are those times where if it just goes well, we can be there, but it’s just those last little things that we need from the car, stuff we’ve not been able to tackle this year. But I feel like we can tackle a little bit more over the winter and into 2024.
“Just like race pace and tire preservation, little things which sometimes are overlooked from an outside perspective, but when you’re driving, you’re like, ‘damn, if I just had this little thing, I could push more consistently, and if I had this I could race better’.
“But we know that some of them coming for next year, so very excited.” Norris and McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri will have the opportunity to claim their first race win on Mar. 2 2024 at the Bahrain Grand Prix, the first race of next season.
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