EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW - LANDO NORRIS

Until we get our car right, a 'win' for me might be just finishing in tenth

- Matt Majendie

FOUR years to the day, Lando Norris still vividly recalls his first race in Formula One in Australia: the nerves, the pressure, the procedures required in the car and the wait for the lights.

His mind was awash with information, the then teenager’s brain overthinking every aspect of his start. He asked himself if he had flicked the right switches, done his burn-outs, turned recharge off.

Then the lights came on — and then off, his foot to the floor amid the roar of the grid.

In two days’ time — in Jeddah, rather than Melbourne — Norris will prepare for more of the same, and ahead of his 84th grand prix start, he has not tired of the sensation.

“It’s such a cool feeling, your foot’s on the throttle, you’re waiting to react and then it just goes,” he says. “It’s still very intense. I still get nervous, but good nerves.

“When the lights come up, you still feel like, ‘here we go’. I don’t think there’s many things that can give the same rush and adrenalin as Formula One.”