McLaren analysis: A look at where it went wrong for Lando Norris in 2024 F1 title fight
Max Verstappen was crowned the 2024 Formula 1 world champion in Las Vegas, ending Lando Norris’ title aspirations.
Ever since his maiden win at the Miami Grand Prix, Norris had been on Verstappen’s tail after McLaren’s US upgrade had propelled them into contention for both F1 titles.
However, whilst McLaren’s Constructors’ bid is still well and truly alive, the British driver will have to wait until next year to fight once again for his first Drivers’ title.
Here, Sports News Blitz writer Harry Whitfield explores the reasons why Norris came just short in his bid to win the 2024 F1 World Championship.
Lack of experience and errors
Before the 2024 season, not many would have expected McLaren to fight Red Bull for both titles this year, especially after Verstappen won four out of the first five races.
The Woking-based outfit’s upgrades in Miami allowed Norris to take his first win, with a bit of luck from a well-timed Safety Car.
It is fair to say McLaren had a mountain to climb after starting the season on the back foot, a sixth and eighth-placed finish in the season opener in Bahrain.
The challenge of chasing the Red Bull and its flying Dutchman Verstappen was always going to be difficult, but the team and Norris have made a lot of mistakes along the way.
The 25-year-old has struggled to convert multiple pole positions and has only led one opening lap (Singapore) after the seven times he has started from pole in both Sprint and Grand Prix races.
Norris only converted two of the seven poles into victory in 2024 compared to Verstappen, who won five of his eight races after starting from the front.
As well as starting races badly, Norris has made some costly errors this year.
In Qualifying for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, he ran wide on his final lap which meant he was knocked out in Q1, as he started the race from 15th to recover to fourth.
His team-mate Oscar Piastri won that race, showing Norris had the potential to win if he’d started further up the grid.
After losing the lead in Brazil, Norris ran wide on the restart, costing him multiple places as he would eventually finish in sixth.
Even in Singapore where he dominated, the Bristol-born racing driver almost binned the car twice despite having a tremendous lead over the competition.
It feels like the 2024 title fight came too soon for Norris, but as his McLaren team principal Andrea Stella pointed out, he has learnt a lot from his failures and will take that into 2025.
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Poor strategy calls by McLaren
I have talked a lot about how Norris has lacked the experience necessary to become an F1 world champion, but equally, McLaren have also been naive in their chase for glory.
Starting with the Canadian Grand Prix, as Norris brilliantly led after storming past Verstappen and George Russell, an ill-timed Safety Car cost this time, unlike Miami.
Although McLaren did have a short window to pit its driver and maintain the lead, it wasn’t a major mistake.
Flash forward to Silverstone for the British Grand Prix, after earlier battles with Piastri and the Mercedes drivers in the wet, Norris led Lewis Hamilton and Verstappen on a drying track.
The team had a set of medium tyres available for Norris, compared to its rivals which did not, but opted against using the mediums in favour of the softs.
McLaren fitted Piastri with the mediums as the Australian trailed far behind the leaders after being left out on the track for too long by the team.
Piastri showed that the mediums were the quickest tyre, and if Norris had been given the right choice he could have won the race instead of finishing third.
Finally, in Brazil, Norris trailed Russell and the pair pitted during a Virtual Safety Car dropping them both behind the Alpines and Verstappen - who had climbed up the order from 17th on the grid.
A Red Flag was brought out and the people who stayed out earned a free pit stop and track position.
If McLaren had decided not to pit Norris and favour track position, the British driver could have continued to fight at the front.
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Piastri team orders
Piastri took his maiden victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix, but only after McLaren ordered that Norris should concede his lead to his team-mate.
The team pitted Norris before Piastri, who led after the race start, at the final round of stops to cover off from Hamilton behind.
A weird move considering Norris’ dominance in Zandvoort to take victory and further ignite his title fight.
After Hungary, Piastri had the confidence to send it down the inside of his team-mate on the opening lap as Norris fell down to third after the audacious but brilliant move.
It was only after this that McLaren decided to prioritise Norris but maybe if they had enacted team orders in favour of its title contender earlier, Norris might have had more points to his name.
Battling multiple world champion and 2025 fight
One of the main reasons Norris lost this title fight has been the brilliance of the now four-time world champion.
Despite having a worse car than Norris for most of the season, Verstappen took victories early on in the year and still competed at the top, even though the Red Bull lacked pace.
The pair did come together three times.
Verstappen’s aggressive nature saw Norris retire in Austria as the two collided, in Austin the 27-year-old’s divebomb defensive manoeuvre saw him finish ahead of the Mclaren and Mexico’s tangle cost Norris the victory.
The three-time Grand Prix winner has learnt from these experiences and will use them for future reference when battling his friend and rival next year.
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