Well, that was certainly a race. Lando Norris took his first win of the season in his shiny new McLaren, followed closely by Max Verstappen in second and George Russell in third. Which doesn’t predict the entire season by any stretch, of course.
For large parts of the 2025 Australian Grand Prix—the parts that weren’t under a safety car because another rookie or Carlos Sainz or Fernando Alonso had crashed—the race was really rather wet. Soaked, even. “Stressful,” as Norris put it.
And yet despite the rain, the safety cars, his teammate doing an unexpected bit of off-roading mid-race, the constant threat of Verstappen, and the fear of crashing himself, Norris remained calm and composed to pick up where he left off in Abu Dhabi last year to record an assured win.
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“To start the season off with a win is good enough, but to do it in such a stressful race, where it’s so easy to make a mistake, so easy to ruin everything so quickly, it can all go wrong within any second of the race,” said Norris.
“It was just very difficult at times to not go into a wall or a tire barrier somewhere. That’s a big enough challenge, but then when you’ve got the weather changing and the track conditions changing, knowing when to make the correct decision to change onto a slick tire or stay out on the Inter tire, and then, even more, when I’ve got Max behind me and Oscar behind me, it’s stressful, but that's what makes it rewarding and such a nice win.”
Though, he’s not counting his chickens just yet. Asked about how it feels to be leading the championship—after one win—he said: “It’s great. Doesn’t mean anything. I’ve not won it, so yeah, I don’t really care at the minute.” That seems fair enough.
His 2024 sparring partner Verstappen admitted Norris’ McLaren “just took off,” and that his Red Bull team “have a lot of work to do to fight for a win.” Russell agreed, noting that “if I risked it more [pushing in the rain], there was no extra reward on the table because they were just so far ahead.”
A few drivers weren’t so far ahead, of course. Of six rookies starting the race, only Kimi Antonelli and Oliver Bearman managed to finish, the other four crashing out. Heck, even Carlos Sainz and Fernando Alonso got caught out.
Asked whether they were comfortable driving past the trucks on track or if they would have preferred a red-flagged race to clear debris, the three were unanimous: “I was comfortable,” said Norris. “Fine,” said Verstappen and Russell.
Though Verstappen added a little bit extra: “I mean, if you crash behind the safety car, you’re really stupid.”
NOTE: This story first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
