Lando Norris recalls the day when he sat with Helmut Marko to have one of the most awkward conversations he ever had.
McLaren star is among the most highly-rated stars in F1 right now. So impressive he has been that the Woking-based team has secured his services till 2025 to sway away from the prying eyes of rivals on him.
But half a decade ago, Norris was far from coming into the F1 scene, and at that time he had a conversation with Red Bull adviser Helmut Marko that he probably wants to forget.
He reveals how Marko called him to Red Bull and asked him about the car he was driving back then. Norris admits that he didn’t know a tiny detail which led to an embarrassing Max Verstappen comparison.
“He just wanted to get to know a little bit about me,” said Norris. “And he was asking me a few questions. How much does a Formula Renault car weigh? I have no idea, I had to come up with something… yeah you know 426 kilos or something like that.”
“I think I ended up saying I don’t actually really know. And the next thing he said was… I don’t know if I should say it… it was ‘Max would know, Max, knows everything about the car’.”
“And yeah I didn’t know what to say after that. I can’t really remember what happened, I just didn’t really say anything, moving on kind of thing. I was speechless and that was about that.”
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Lando Norris had no offer from Red Bull
Norris was further asked whether he got an offer from Red Bull, the McLaren star denied. Further, the 22-year-old claims he is glad that he kept a distance with Red Bull, as he and his manager didn’t want him on a leash.
“No offer, no. I was in a good position with what I was doing and my manager looked after a lot of conversations, and for the best,” Norris continued. “There might have been something but I ended up not joining Red bull.”
“And continuing the run I was in at the time, which was just doing well in Formula Renault, ended up winning that. Being a free guy, not getting caught up in Red bull, like once you’re in you’re on a tight leash of what you can do.”
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