Formula 1: How Lando Norris secured his maiden podium
After an impressive drive and a ballsy last lap, McLaren’s Lando Norris took full advantage of Lewis Hamilton’s time penalty to bring home his maiden trophy in Formula 1. Let’s look into how the young British star managed to work his way into podium contention at the opening round of the 2020 season in Austria.
Who had money on Lando Norris getting third place in the 2020 Formula 1 season opener? Anyone? Didn’t think so.
During the career of a promising Formula 1 driver, there is always a single moment or race when they make their name. Whether its a win, a strong drive or even an overtake, it always happens. Norris, the self-dubbed “full-time twitch streamer and part-time racing driver”, made his name in the 2020 Austrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring.
After what was a very impressive outing in qualifying, the young McLaren driver was able to keep his momentum rolling into the race. And even though the Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas ultimately led every lap of the 71-lap event, everyone was talking about Norris. But just how did he find himself in this position? Well, let’s start from lights out.
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Perhaps everyone watching knew polesitter Bottas would lead into turn one on the opening lap around the 10-turn, 2.683-mile (4.318-kilometer) road course in Spielberg, Styria, Austria.
But Norris found himself starting in the third grid slot, almost alongside the Red Bull of Max Verstappen. It was clear that the drivers on the outside of turn one were going to use the run-off option. Missing out on all the mess on the inside was basically the smart option, and Norris was the first to utilize said option. A clean turn one left him with a good slipstream up the hill as he attempted moves around the outside of Verstappen but decided to remain in a safe third place.
Fast forward 10 laps and the very bright orange and blue McLaren was sitting in fifth position, which would have been a strong finish for McLaren. At this point, Alexander Albon in his Red Bull and Lewis Hamilton in his Mercedes had done what was expected of them and swiftly passed Norris.
This enabled Norris and McLaren to focus on their realistic target: finishing ahead of the Racing Point of Sergio Perez — or the pink Mercedes. Whichever you prefer.
Anyway, back to it. To gain a good result, luck has to become your friend. And Norris’s dab of luck happened on lap 11 when Verstappen, who was sitting in a comfortable second position, found his car slowing due to a suspected electrical issue. This would be the first of many technical retirements. But for Norris, who was now up to fourth position, this was a blessing.
Just for everyone’s benefit, we are clicking fast forward again to lap 33. Let’s be honest, not much happened between lap 11 to lap 33. The beloved safety car made its first appearance of the season as more drivers joined Verstappen on the bench.
Obviously, with the safety car being called, everyone ended up being bunched up, leaving some drivers vulnerable, including Norris. By deciding to pit onto the hard compound tires, Perez in the pink Mercedes/Racing Point had an advantage on a fresh set of mediums. Norris couldn’t reply to this attack as Perez breezed his way past the McLaren into turn four. But Norris and McLaren had chosen to play the long game.
Can we all say a big thank you to George Russell? A fuel pressure problem caused his Williams to park up, calling out the safety car on lap 51. Suddenly, the race had been flipped upside down.
Everyone was hyped for the restart, and then within 30 seconds, the safety car was called again, massively slowing down the momentum of the race. But if Kimi Raikkonen’s wheel didn’t feel like exiting stage left (or right), then we would not have gotten this ending.
On lap 61, the green flag finally dropped with 11 laps remaining. Norris was still battling with Perez but was now joined by Charles Leclerc in the tractor Ferrari as well as his McLaren teammate Carlos Sainz Jr.
But it was up ahead which opened everybody’s eyes even more. Albon was on fresh soft tires and attacked Hamilton around the outside of turn four, a very impressive move that was thought to have been pulled off — that is, until Hamilton’s front left tire made contact with Albon’s right rear tire, causing the Red Bull to spin and spit plenty of gravel onto the track.
It was a very bad day for Red Bull overall. This incident, however, played perfectly into the hands of the group headed by Perez. With Albon now out of the way and Hamilton being issued a five-second time penalty, the other drivers could smell the podium, like sharks smelling blood.
However, Norris didn’t help himself. A weak attempt at an overtake on Perez on lap 64 left him more than vulnerable to an attack from the charging Ferrari of Leclerc. It was an invitation which Leclerc accepted rather quickly.
Now with this loss of momentum, Norris had to defend against Sainz, a battle which, just for a moment, looked like it could end in tears. But fortunately for McLaren, it didn’t. Having regained his composure, Norris saw Leclerc’s impressive and successful send on Perez for third place, and he knew he had to follow suit. Although Norris’s attempt wasn’t as pretty as Leclerc’s was, he got the job done. Perez, on his quickly degrading tires, had no response.
During this battle, however, the stewards had issued Perez a five-second time penalty for speeding in the pits out of nowhere, a penalty which Norris didn’t even know about until after his move had been completed.
But Norris had three laps to stay within five seconds of Hamilton, and the car problems Hamilton had been experiencing earlier had suddenly disappeared. What a coincidence.
So did Norris do it?
Of course he did. With his engine turned up to the brim, Norris produced the best final lap of his life. By securing fastest lap of the race and an extra world championship point on the final trip around the track, the gap to Hamilton decreased at every corner, and it was clocked to be 4.802 seconds at the finish line.
So officially, he was 0.198 seconds ahead of Hamilton for the third and final podium spot. He had secured the bag in the very last moment. It must be special to work your way onto a Formula 1 podium, but it has to be even more satisfying to achieve that by surprising and knocking a six-time world champion out of the top three in the closing seconds of the race.
It was a drive, and a race, that we all hope can be produced again. And thankfully for all of us, we do not have long to wait, as Formula 1 is set to return to Austria for another race this Sunday, July 5.