Norris reveals Andrea Stella bet after Friday struggles before Hungarian Grand Prix victory
Lando Norris has revealed he was so unconvinced by McLaren's prospects after Friday practice at the Hungarian Grand Prix that McLaren team principal Andrea Stella challenged him to a bet over the team's pace.
Norris, who went on to secure pole position on Saturday before winning Sunday's race in dominant fashion, admitted his confidence was at a low after the opening day of running at the Hungaroring.
"No, I don't think so, especially after FP1, I didn't," Norris said when asked whether he believed on Friday night that he had a car capable of winning.
"Actually, Andrea wanted to make a bet with me because I was pretty disappointed with the pace and how the car was handling in FP1."
Although McLaren made progress during the second practice session, Norris still felt the team was trailing Ferrari heading into qualifying.
"It got a little bit better in FP2, but still, the Ferraris were just on another level, and I really didn't expect to get as close as we did in qualifying."
The turning point came overnight as changing weather conditions transformed the balance of the MCL40. A shift in the wind direction between Friday and Saturday gave Norris the confidence he had been lacking throughout practice.
"But the wind changed from Friday to Saturday, and Saturday's wind really suited our car a lot more. We had a lot more confidence in driving the car, so I could push more."
That confidence translated into pole position, and by race day Norris felt he had the pace to beat anyone: "Then I certainly felt like I could be on pole yesterday, and I felt like I could win the race today."
Despite losing the lead to teammate Oscar Piastri on the opening lap, Norris never doubted he would eventually come out on top. He believes his race pace was among the strongest performances of his Formula 1 career.
"I think today the race pace was much better than I was expecting. The degradation was much better than I was expecting too. But it was probably one of my best performances personally, in terms of driving the car."
Norris spent much of the opening stint shadowing Piastri, remaining within striking distance despite the Hungaroring's reputation as one of Formula 1's most difficult circuits for overtaking.
"The fact I could keep up with Oscar on this kind of track, where it's impossible to follow and impossible to overtake, I was within eight-tenths or something for, I don't know, almost 40 laps."
"The fact I could do this is what gave me confidence that I'd win the race no matter what, whether he boxed early or late or whatever. The pace advantage I had was huge today."
Asked why he enjoyed such a significant advantage over his teammate despite both McLaren drivers having identical machinery, Norris pointed to the work he has put in behind the scenes rather than any difference in equipment.
"I don't know why. The cars are identical, and I've just been feeling very strong lately. I've worked on many areas from last year. I feel much more confident lately with how to extract performance, and I've worked a lot with my engineers to understand this car because it's certainly not an easy car to understand and figure out how to drive on the limit consistently."
Summing up the reasons behind his turnaround from Friday's frustration to Sunday's victory, Norris kept his answer simple.
"Why? Just hard work. Hard work from my engineers and from myself to improve me as a driver and improve my driving."
