Carlos Sainz: Lando Norris shows you can win F1 title without being a “badass”

Carlos Sainz has lauded former teammate Lando Norris for showing you can win an F1 title while being a “nice guy”.

Norris was crowned 2025 F1 world champion after his third-place finish at the Yas Marina Circuit.

He becomes McLaren’s first world champion since Lewis Hamilton in 2008 and ends Max Verstappen’s run of dominance.

Speaking to Sky Sports after Norris’ title triumph, Sainz praised the McLaren driver for “being himself” despite external criticism.

“Very happy for him as a driver because he’s always been an extremely quick driver, quicker than what people give him credit for, extremely talented.

“The first years at McLaren, I saw a guy who had the speed to be multiple world champion if it was purely down to speed.

“Along the way, he’s developed his skills a lot and now he’s a world champion. More than anything, I’m happy for him as a person because he’s a driver that doesn’t follow the typical stereotypes of a world champion, he’s always stayed true to himself, very honest, very open about his own struggles and proven to everyone you can be world champion being a nice guy, or don’t have to be ruthless or badass.

“Happy for him, I hope he stays the same, it doesn’t get in his head that he’s world champion and he keeps being himself, or even if he relaxes more, and can enjoy F1 more.

“He must have suffered a bit this year with all the social media pressure, journalism pressure from criticising him when he was struggling in the first half, then when Max was getting close. It’s never easy to be world champion with Max breathing down his neck but he’s kept it more or less under control.”

Norris “unbelievably fast”

Sainz and Norris were teammates for two seasons at McLaren between 2019 and 2020.

Naturally, with Sainz the more experienced driver, he out-scored Norris in both seasons.

However, Norris out-qualified Sainz across their time together, highlighting his raw speed.

“Yeah, honestly, very happy for him. I think he’s a great F1 driver. I think unbelievably fast,” Sainz told reporters.

“But with his particular way of going about life and things, as much as he’s got criticised a lot during the last few years for being how he is, he’s world champion and everyone can keep dreaming about being F1 world champion while he goes about his own way and does things his own way.

“So I’m extremely happy for him because he must have felt a lot of pressure over the last few weekends and he managed to pull it off.”