Lando Norris has revealed that his biggest lesson from McLaren’s failed title defence in 2026 is that past achievements provide no guarantee of future success in Formula 1.
McLaren entered this season as back-to-back reigning Constructors’ Champions, but the team hasn’t been in the running to retain the crown again at any stage this year.
Lando Norris insists 2026 hasn’t been a failure for McLaren
With a scheduled three rounds remaining, Mercedes has already secured both titles, while McLaren lags 254 points behind its newly-crowned power unit supplier in fourth.
The Woking-based squad anticipated that it would begin the campaign on the back foot, given the extensive overhaul to the regulations and the resources that the side exerted last term on ensuring that it clinched a first championship double since 1998.
But despite not being given the machinery to preserve his reign as world champion, Norris, who has claimed three victories in 2026, including at the previous race in Sao Paulo, reiterated his stance that McLaren’s season should not be regarded as a failure.
“I don’t think we’ve done many things badly this season,” he expressed. “I think we knew at the beginning of the season [there was] a big challenge ahead of us because of coming into a new regulation after last season; generally, that is a good part of it.
“I think we’ve actually had a very successful season in terms of catching up to our competition and starting easily a long, long way off, over a second off compared to Mercedes and the other teams. For us to catch up, I think you can easily see a lot more of it as success than a failure.
“So, I certainly don’t want to look at it as like this year has been a failure because we won two seasons in a row. I think the expectation to win a third in a row is already a very high expectation. To win it in one of the biggest regulation changes ever, I think, is almost an impossible dream because you’re not able to do everything at once.
“You’re not able to fight for a world championship last year and fight for every last upgrade and bit of performance and also come into this season just as confident. It’s just an impossible trait to have.
“So the compromise was this season for a world championship last season, and that’s one I think we’ll continue to always make.”
More from PlanetF1.com
Norris highlighted that McLaren’s plight compared to the heights it reached at the end of the ground effect era demonstrates how quickly the landscape can evolve in F1.
“The biggest lesson is nothing comes easy,” the Briton continued. “That’s really it.
“I think certainly this season we’ve seen an upgrade battle. We’ve seen better and more consistent performances from all of our rival teams, the top two teams, and we’ve seen them performing at a better level than ever before.
“So I think when you look at it from this way, a championship doesn’t mean anything for the future. It doesn’t mean you’re going to be more successful. It doesn’t mean anything.
“Every year is a complete reset, and the amount of effort and time and dedication every single person has to put in in a team is more than the year before, so even if you’re successful, it means you have to work even harder than the next year.
“So I think in a positive way, it’s that nothing ever comes easy, and you have to always keep working harder than you realise.
“But I certainly don’t want it to come across like it’s been a negative season from that perspective; everyone has high expectations, and so do we. So we certainly wanted to do better. But in a time when people are doing such a good job as our competition, in a season where the regulation change was so huge, I think you still have to see the season as a successful upturn in events and results more than a disappointment because of how the last two seasons went.”