The surprising change in Lando Norris’ demeanour after Max Verstappen inflicted huge F1 title blow

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Lando Norris is poised to lose out on the 2024 world championship to Max Verstappen. With just 86 points available, Verstappen is now 62 clear.

Norris had a chance to ignite the F1 title race when he started the Sao Paulo Grand Prix from pole position. Verstappen was starting down in 17th after a shock Q2 exit – his first of the season – and a five-place engine penalty.

Remarkably, Verstappen gained 18 points on Norris from this position. He produced one of his best-ever drives to take victory, while his rival slipped to sixth after an ill-timed red flag and a couple of mistakes.

Come December, when the F1 world reflects on the season, some will argue that there was never really a title race at all. From the Miami GP in May, when Norris scored his first-ever victory, he never got closer than 44 points.

That was the margin between the two after he won the Sprint race in Brazil, with Verstappen only fourth after a five-second penalty. But it would taken a Grand Prix victory at Interlagos, and a poor result for the Red Bull, to generate serious pressure.

Still, McLaren and Norris ought to view this as a missed opportunity. They’ve had, by most accounts, the fastest car in F1 for about three-quarters of a season, but failed to press home that advantage.

Lando Norris looked like he could ‘breathe out and relax’ as Max Verstappen closed on F1 title

Speaking on the RacingNews365 podcast, Dutch journalist Ruud Dimmers shared the change he’d noticed in Norris’ demeanour after the race in Brazil. He felt the 24-year-old looked almost ‘relieved’.

His first title fight has been a burden, but now it’s almost certainly over. That will allow him to ‘relax’ in the remaining races.

Dimmers says there have been fewer glimpses of the usually ‘nice and optimistic’ Norris this year. He seemed to grow increasingly frustrated with questions about Verstappen, telling one reporter he ‘didn’t care’ after Sprint qualifying last time out.

“Actually at the end of that race in Brazil, it seemed as if he was almost just relieved,” Dimmers said. “He had been running races for a long time with his soul under his arm.

“He was really happy when he had the pole position. We saw that boy from before – nice and optimistic.

“And now the championship pressure came in, whether it was a real title fight or not. In Brazil, it was done. He looked like [he could] breathe out and relax.”

How Max Verstappen can win the world championship at Las Vegas Grand Prix

Heading into the Las Vegas GP, the simplest permutation is that Verstappen will be champion if he wins. But he required an epic downpour to take victory in Brazil, such are Red Bull’s struggles in the dry.

Indeed, that win ended a 10-race drought, so he shouldn’t necessarily be optimistic of a repeat in Nevada. Still, there will only be 60 points on offer in Qatar and Abu Dhabi, so he just needs outscore Norris by two (he already owns the tiebreaker of most wins).

David Coulthard says Norris must adopt the same attitude as Verstappen from next year. He’ll enter as one of the favourites, with minimal changes to the cars and Red Bull no longer enjoying the early-season advantage that proved crucial this term.

One area he absolutely has to address is his race starts. Norris has had better reaction times than Verstappen but has often been hampered by wheelspin.