Norris won the world championship in the final race in Abu Dhabi, pipping Max Verstappen by just two points
Lando Norris has revealed he thought last year’s season-finale in Abu Dhabi would be “too chaotic” for him before the Briton sealed his first F1 world championship.
McLaren driver Norris won his first title with a third-place finish at the final race of the 2025 season in December, with race winner Max Verstappen falling two points short of an incredulous comeback.
Norris, 26, has regularly criticised himself after mistakes on track in the past few years but managed to maintain his composure to seal McLaren’s first drivers’ championship since Lewis Hamilton’s victory in 2008.
Now, a month on from his victory in a new video on his YouTube channel, Norris has revealed the self-doubt in his mind before the final round in Abu Dhabi.
“The week leading up to the biggest race of my life? I didn’t how to act, how I was meant to be,” Norris said, speaking to the camera, in a video titled “THE BEST 24 HOURS OF MY LIFE”.
“I didn’t know if I was meant to be really excited or not… scared. I thought I’d be pretty damn nervous. I get nervous in every race, every qualifying, always, that’s a normal thing. I thought it’d be a bit too chaotic for me.
“But then getting in the car, I felt very ready, very calm. I still knew in my head: ‘this is it’. The time had come.”
Norris was running in third place for most of the grand prix, in the knowledge that any mistake would prove season-defining, but the Bristolian only allowed himself to think of the finish line in the final couple of laps.
“It felt like a normal race but with two laps to go, the time starts to slow down a little bit,” he added.
“You think about every screw, bolt, wire, and imagine inside my car what everything is doing. You’re in that moment: damn, what could go wrong? Because everything is going right.
“That’s how the last two laps went until I went under the hotel [four corners left], then I pictured my mum in the garage.
“That was the first moment all year I just about started to realise what was about to happen. I pictured everyone in the garage for the final 4 corners, then that next step of emotion starts to kick in and it’s the realisation of what’s happened.
“The last 18 years all led to this one moment.”
The video also showed a brief behind the scenes interaction between Norris and McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri – who missed out on the world title – with the Australian congratulating Norris.
McLaren launch their 2026 car on Monday, 9 February in Bahrain, prior to the second of three pre-season tests.
Norris’s defence of his world championship starts with the season-opening Australian Grand Prix on 8 March in Melbourne.
Category: General Sports
