From serving tea in the garages to McLaren's F1 2025 drivers champion - Lando Norris' journey to the top.
- yasminx39
- Dec 10, 2025
- 4 min read
With an array of fireworks, a smoky donut celebration and loud cheers from a crowd of thousands, the Abu Dhabi grand prix saw Lando Norris win his first drivers’ championship. Lando Norris evidently flooded with emotions, tears and disbelief at what he had managed to achieve, climbed out, stood on top of his car and threw his arms up in the air before bringing his hands to his face in what can only be described as a moment of relief for the British driver. He then turned around and immediately jumped down from his winning car to first congratulate his contenders, Max Verstappen and teammate Oscar Piastri, to then run straight into the arms of his parents and swiftly turn to hi-5 the team that helped him achieve this lifelong dream. When he came across the line, his race engineer, Will Joseph, announced, “That’s it mate, you are world champion, world champion!”, Lando replied with teary words saying, “you’ve made a kid’s dream come true, thank you so much”.
His words perfectly highlighting that this moment was not just a fluke in the 2025 season, but years and years of hard work, talent and money put into a child’s dream of achieving the most celebrated individual achievement at the pinnacle of motorsport.
Lando Norris’ name first entered the motorsport world in 2007 where he started competitive karting races around the age of 7. With his father’s backing and encouragement, Lando entered multiple series and achieved his first WSK Euro series championship in 2013. The following year he started racing sportscars in the Ginetta Junior championship with an impressive 4 wins achieving him bronze in the championship. His career excelled further in 2015 as he entered the F4 series with Carlin as well as the German series with Mucke Motorsport. He made remarkable moves through the season upholding his talent in the junior motorsport world. The following year, he gained even more experience entering multiple racing series around Europe and New Zealand which gained him access into F3 in 2017. His busy career was further noticed when he won the Autosport BRDC award for ‘Young driver of the year’. His F3 career saw him win the championship title and catch the eyes of the McLaren racing team where he impressed them further in a Hungarian F1 test as he set the second quickest time of the day.
2017 was the year that Lando Norris joined the McLaren racing team as a development driver at 17 years old (alongside competing in F3). The following year continued to be busy as he was promoted into a reserve driver role while also competing in the F2 series with Campos racing. His hard work and effort paid off in 2019 as he was then promoted to the position of a McLaren F1 racing driver at 19 years of age. He made his debut at the Australian Grand Prix. Although his speed and talent were evident, it wasn’t until 2024 that he finally scored his first grand prix win in Miami foreshadowing a domino effect of 10 more wins before achieving the ultimate dream of winning the driver world championship just a season later.
Lando described it as “long journey” to achieve what only an elite name of athletes gets to achieve. From karting, to multiple single seater series, to ‘work experience’ and development with McLaren – these are all moments accumulated into making him the young driver he is today. One of the most known memorable moments of his younger years at McLaren was of course the video of him serving tea to the 2x world champion Fernando Alonso or in the background of a video by Will Buxton on a ladder with the engineers (videos linked below).
While the media has pounded him with the nicknames such as ‘lando no wins’ and viewers have tried to discourage him with ‘booing’ and complain he doesn’t have the icy harsh championship mindset needed to win; Norris has continuously tried his best to shun out the noise and maintain true to who he is. As he told the ‘F1 Nation’ podcast, ‘I managed to win it the way I want to win it, which is not by being someone I’m not, not trying to be as aggressive as Max, or as forceful as other champions… I’m just happy I won it my way. I can go out and be myself and win it Lando’s way’. This sets a healthy tone to younger athletes that their dreams are achievable through hard work and being honest with yourself.
Lando Norris has continuously been a vocal character in the world of sports of how important it is to maintain a healthy open relationship with your mental health. Through his struggles with the media, hate online, intrusive thoughts and what can feel like the world trying to bring him down; he is a person who in his own words has ‘turned my struggles into strengths’. He fixed his weaknesses on track, he blocked out the noise, he changed his psychology, stayed honest and through that journey won the uniquely elite title of 2025 driver world championship in Formula One.
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