Lando Norris has played down title expectations having taken a commanding lead in the world championship after the S\u00e3o Paulo Grand Prix, warning he had a long way to go and that he did not expect to be competitive at the next round in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n
Norris won with a commanding drive from pole at Interlagos while his title rival and McLaren<\/a> teammate Oscar Piastri could manage only fifth. Max Verstappen delivered a magnificent performance in a Red Bull that was quicker than the McLaren to come back from 19th to third, but his heroics only limited the damage to his title hopes as Norris opened a clear gap on his two competitors.<\/p>\n However Norris, who also won with a dominant drive at the previous round in Mexico<\/a>, remained circumspect about his chances, insisting he was not yet considering becoming champion.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not thinking about it, not yet, not at all,\u201d Norris said. \u201cIt\u2019s a great win, but to see Max and how quick he was, that\u2019s where my mind is at and there is a long way to go.\u201d<\/p>\n The 25-year-old British driver leads Piastri by 24 points and Verstappen by 49 with three meetings remaining and 83 points available. Norris could afford to finish second to Piastri in all three races and the sprint in Qatar and still seal the title.<\/p>\n Norris has managed a remarkable comeback over the past six races, having been 34 points behind Piastri after the Dutch GP in August<\/a>. Since then his teammate has not finished in front of him.<\/p>\n However, he also steadfastly maintained that he did not believe the past two races had been a turning point in the championship.<\/p>\n \u201cNo, it just feels like another weekend where I came here to try and win, to get the most points I could and did that,\u201d he said. \u201cI also did that last weekend. Neither are turning points, they\u2019re just strong results, which is exactly what I need, exactly what I\u2019m fighting for every single weekend and every day.\u201d<\/p>\n Norris has recovered from a tricky opening to the season as he struggled with his car and Piastri had held the title lead since the Saudi Arabian GP in April. However, as McLaren worked on adapting the car to better suit his style and the feel for front grip he prefers, Norris set about addressing what he had identified as his weaknesses \u2013 work which the team principal, Andrea Stella, acknowledged as key to his title charge.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we are seeing with Lando is just an ability to exploit his potential from a driving point of view but also an evolution as a driver,\u201d Stella said. \u201cThere\u2019s been quite a lot of work around Lando, with Lando, led by Lando, in terms of evolving from a personal point of view, gaining the resilience that is required in this kind of competition.\u201d<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The best of our sports journalism from the past seven days and a heads-up on the weekend\u2019s action<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n