Max Verstappen pulls back the curtain on inviting Lando Norris to be his Red Bull teammate
Max Verstappen expressed his feelings on inviting Lando Norris to Red Bull to be his teammate. The Dutch driver secured his 4th world title at Las Vegas by finishing the race ahead of his title rival.
The 2024 F1 season started in a dominant fashion for the Red Bull driver, as the RB20 was the class of the field. The driver went on a dominant run until the race in Miami, wherein he dropped just one race in Australia due to reliability issues. With that being said, once McLaren introduced the upgrade in Miami, the team caught up with the reigning champions in terms of performance.
What followed afterward was a season where Red Bull continued to regress and its rivals surged. Max Verstappen, however, managed his early season lead in the standings to win the title. The season also featured quite a few battles between him and Norris, who proved to be his closest challenger but just not good enough.
Verstappen, who has been friends with Norris off-track, talked about the McLaren and even shared how back in the day he had even invited him to join Red Bull alongside him. As quoted by RacingNews365, Verstappen said:
"I've spent, of course, quite a lot of moments with Lando before," Verstappen said. "So when I was already winning and he wasn't, I always told him, 'Your time will come. Stick to the process. I think you're in a good team environment'. I happily invited him also to be my team-mate at the time, if you want to win, you can come here [to Red Bull] as well."
He added:
"But of course, I'm happy for him. He had a great season, maybe not everything went his way this year, but that's just part of the road that you're on. You make mistakes, you learn from it. It's about how you bounce back from it."
"We are not best friends": Max Verstappen on Lando Norris
Max Verstappen and Lando Norris are usually the drivers who have been seen hanging out together off-track. The drivers are seen playing paddle and even sometimes have been seen playing golf as well. During the season when the two started competing against each other on track, there were moments when the tension ramped up.
The relationship between the two was constantly a talking point for many, but Verstappen claims that the two are friends; he clarified that they are not best friends, as each has his own close circle. He said:
"We are friends now, we are not best friends, it's not like I call him day to day. Both of us have our own best friends, that's how you grow up, right? But we are friends. I have a lot of respect for him."
Max Verstappen ended the season as a 4-time world champion in 2024 but it would be interesting to see how the dynamics between him and Lando Norris evolve, especially since the two could be banging wheels again in 2025.