Lando Norris opens up on psychologist help with crucial 2025 title margin
Lando Norris celebrates winning the F1 2025 championship.
Lando Norris believes his work with a psychologist in the second half of the F1 2025 season helped him enough to win his maiden world championship title.
The McLaren man held his nerve against a huge points comeback from Max Verstappen to win the world title by just two points after a 24-race calendar.
Lando Norris: Working with a psychologist played its part
The British driver has been open about struggling more with his mental health and being a more sensitive type than F1’s dominant character, Max Verstappen, against whom Norris has ended up fighting for the title across the last two seasons.
In F1 2024, Norris came out second-best after his season crumbled away from him towards the end of the year, despite Verstappen struggling for outright competitiveness.
But, in 2025, Norris and McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri commanded the first half of the year to set up an intra-team battle for the title, with Norris not cowed by Piastri in the same way that his title fight with Verstappen had gone the year before.
With Norris putting in a late-season charge to catch and pass Piastri in the points standings, Norris did have to look over his shoulder at the relentless pursuit of Verstappen as the Dutch driver started to enjoy his Red Bull and secure result after result that saw him close on the leading duo.
As the tension mounted, Norris held his nerve to secure the results he needed – including third place in Abu Dhabi – to see off Verstappen by two points and take the title.
With mind management being an area Norris has acknowledged could have tripped him up, he took on the services of a psychologist in the middle of 2025 to help him work on eliminating distractions and to keep his focus, as he detailed to Sky Sports News.
“Very,” he told Craig Slater, when asked about the significance of a psychologist to his championship bid.
“When you look at the end of the season, two points were all I needed, you know?
“There are plenty of places that I could have gotten more points. There’s also plenty of places I could have lost more points, and it’s hard to quantify, ‘Did this one meeting help you get this many points?’
“You don’t really know this thing, because it’s just a collection of work, and you go through everything, ‘Is this going to help you potentially do a better job?’
“If it’s a yes, you’ve got to do as many of those different things as you can. Certainly, working with a psychologist and different people in many different areas all played a part.
“How much? Very difficult to know. But did it make me perform better? Did it allow me to get wins in the second half of the season and have that run, which I would say effectively got me the championship in the end? Yes.
“So every small piece can add up and make a big difference.”
Watch our drifting finale with V14
Lando Norris: I won without having to change
Norris has previously spoken about his desire to remain true to his own personality, without having to develop a harder edge.
This vulnerability and honesty in holding his hands up when his performances haven’t delivered a top result are in stark contrast to the seemingly unshakeable self-belief displayed by Verstappen in the Red Bull, and it’s led to media and fan hypothesizing that Norris would need to ‘toughen up’ in order to become a world champion.
But, for Norris, he’s managed to achieve his life’s goal without having to compromise on this side of himself.
“I won without it, which is, for sure, one of the coolest parts of it, and I won it without having to be like that,” he said.
“It’s not like that’s always going to be the correct thing.
“I’m sure in the future I will need to, and I gotta force myself to be, because it’s just not naturally me.
“I was not born, and I’ve not grown up as much with that kind of natural fighter instinct, but it’s a great thing, and I think that it does help with so many aspects of going out and trying to be the best athlete in your sport.
“I completely agree with that, but it’s not that you have to only have that in order to win. There’s a mix and a match to it all.”
As for being unapologetically transparent in his vulnerability, Norris said he’d rather be that than faking a dishonest front.
“I don’t know, truthfully. I don’t know why sometimes I tell you guys [the media] as much stuff as I do,” he told the BBC.
“Sometimes I get told I shouldn’t, and sometimes I probably do tell too much, or reveal too much, and people can see vulnerabilities in that and so forth.
“Maybe at times that’s a mistake. But at the same time, at least I’m being truthful to my own self. If I’m doing a bad job, I tell myself I’m doing a bad job, and I certainly have people around me telling me the truth about things.
“What I hate the most is the opposite, is doing a bad job and someone going, ‘That’s all right, you’ll be fine, things will just get better.’ Because it’s just not the case.
“I hate that kind of mentality and approach, and I’ve certainly not been brought up in that way. People around me have certainly not been like that.
“It’s very much a brutal honesty which has made me the person I am today. But I’m also just, I think quite an open, honest person, I will just say what I believe.”
Read Next: Norris’ World title ‘fluke’? McLaren driver will be ‘want to prove’ that’s not the case
