Norris feeling ‘rare’ experience of being confident
Lando Norris says his current confidence within himself behind the wheel is a “rare” experience, as he now knows where the speed in his car can be optimised.
Alongside his two podium finishes in 2021, Norris is now the only driver on the Formula 1 grid to have scored points in every race this season – as well as notching more than twice the points tally than his more experienced team-mate, Daniel Ricciardo.
Now in his third season in Formula 1, the young Brit had previously said his MCL35M is still not quite to his liking, but he’s feeling confident at being able to push his car to the limits by adjusting his driving style accordingly.
A touching moment post-race in Baku, as @LandoNorris pays tribute to the late Mansour Ojjeh by dedicating P5 to him 👊#AzerbaijanGP 🇦🇿 #F1 @McLarenF1 pic.twitter.com/y92EN14d7C
— Formula 1 (@F1) June 7, 2021
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“I feel confident in myself, which is rare,” Norris told Sky Sports. “I feel confident that I just know how to drive with a car you can push in certain areas.
“It’s clear a lot of the time what needs to be worked on and when you put a few simple things together, things can start going well and you can get a lot of confidence and a lot of performance out of the car.
“We still want to be fighting Red Bull and Mercedes and they are still quite a way ahead of us. We have a good amount of confidence, not overly confident, but just in a good position so we’ll just keep doing what we’ve been doing.”
On his confidence, he says it plays a big part in how he can perform on a regular basis – without wanting to ever admit when he felt sub-optimal behind the wheel in his earlier races.
He added: “It’s something that’s hard to think of in the first few years of Formula 1 because you never want to think ‘I’ve got no confidence in myself’.
“But it makes a bigger difference than you think eventually when you do get that confidence and you feel like you know what you need to do – I know how to put a good lap together, how to put a good weekend together and things like that.
“You hate to admit it when you’re a bit younger and inexperienced and things like that, it’s hard to admit that you don’t know what to do, but now I’m in a position where I feel like I do know more what to do and when you accomplish it and put it all together you get a good reward.”
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