"Why not?" - McLaren boss backs Lando Norris to win every race in second half of the season

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella believes Lando Norris could do a Sebastian Vettel from 2013 and win every race in the second half of the 2024 season after his Dutch GP win on Sunday.

The former four-time world champion became the first driver to win nine consecutive races and go the entire second half after the summer break unbeaten in 2013 to claim his fourth straight world title.

Heading into the Dutch Grand Prix, Lando Norris was 78 points behind three-time world champion Max Verstappen with 10 races and three Sprints remaining in the 2024 season.

Although there's a possibility that the McLaren driver could take the title away from Verstappen, speaking with Motorsportweek, Stella sounded optimistic about Norris's prospects:

“I think in the Constructors’ Championship, the game was on even before this event. On the Drivers’ Championship (Norris is still 70 points behind Verstappen), we definitely wanted to keep our head and our focus on the fact that it was possible.

“We even talked and looked at what Vettel did in 2013, and we said we may do the same. Why not? We need to keep the focus. We need to think this is possible."

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Lando Norris gives his take on impact of upgrades at 2024 Dutch GP

McLaren driver Lando Norris said that the upgrade package introduced by the Woking-based outfit didn't play a huge role in his over 20-second win margin over Max Verstappen.

In the post-race press conference, the 24-year-old said:

"I still feel like we probably would have won without the upgrades this weekend. The upgrades didn't make us certainly a lot quicker here, you know, but the upgrades we've been putting on the car, they've helped us every time. It's not like we put it on and questioned it.

"We put it on and it was just… It did everything it wanted to do and needed to do and it wasn't meant to do. We've taken our time, and this was our first upgrade since Miami. Yes, we've had little bits along the way, but just like tweaks, it's nothing that's like his performance." he added.

Lando Norris showed that he had a lot of pace in the bank, as he produced the fastest lap of the race in Zandvoort on Sunday on older hard tyres.

The British driver's second F1 win enabled him to cut eight points from Verstappen's lead in the driver's championship. McLaren closed the gap to Red Bull in the Constructor's Championship to 30 points, with arguably the fastest car in the sport at the moment.