McLaren address the ‘champions’ trait Lando Norris needs to improve

Henry Valantine 13 Oct 2023 10:00 AM

McLaren driver Lando Norris looks on during the Italian Grand Prix weekend. — McLaren driver Lando Norris was heavily critical of himself in Qatar.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella has praised Lando Norris for his “honesty”, but believes he needs to “find the right balance” moving forward when it comes to self-criticism.

Norris was his own harshest critic in Qatar after coming from 10th on the grid to finish on the podium in the race, while finishing third in the sprint as team-mate Oscar Piastri took the win.

That did not stop him from critiquing his performances however, believing he should have taken pole in both qualifying sessions – claiminghe did “another bad job”in Saturday’s sprint shootout before admitting it “hurts” him to have seen Piastri take a victory.

Andrea Stella: Lando Norris needs to find ‘balance’ with self-criticism

Stella, who has directly worked with the likes of Michael Schumacher, Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso in the past at Ferrari, explained that a trait he sees in champions is knowing when and, crucially, when not to communicate your frustration to the world.

While the McLaren team boss praised Norris for his character and how he does not want to be seen as an “arrogant” driver, he thinks there is scope for him to be less “harsh” on himself in future.

“Lando is such an honest person and I think he perpetuates this honesty in every kind of relationship, including the one with himself,” Stella told media in Qatar.

“I think he wants to make sure that if he gets it wrong, he gets it from the honesty point of view. He doesn’t want to look arrogant, he doesn’t want to look like: ‘I’m not acknowledging that I could have done better, so I make it very clear.’

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“但与此同时,就像我之前说的关于champions, you need to find the right balance, and you need to find the right dynamics in terms of communication to the world and in terms of communication to yourself, to put yourself in the position to perform today, and in the position to keep improving every day.

“So I think even how harsh he was on himself, following especially the qualifying on Friday will be an element of review – and this review will happen again, very honestly, and he will calibrate over time to see: ‘How tough do I really have to be with myself? What is the target here? To be faster in every single corner, in every single lap, in every single session? Or just be the best, which doesn’t imply all the rest?’

“So I mean, there’s a bit of a journey, which is for Lando, it will be for Oscar, and is for each of us in the team.”