Despite not being a Grand Prix winner yet, Lando Norris has already made a good name for himself in F1. Racing for McLaren, Norris has often been mixing it up at the sharp end of the grid, whenever the opportunity came. Many rate the Briton as a future world champion and praise his talent and on-track skills. One of his former teammates, Jehan Daruvala also thinks so. Daruvala raced alongside the McLaren driver during their Eurocup Formula Renault days in 2016. The Indian driver feels that Norris has “something special” ever since then.
In an exclusive interview with Daily Star UK, Daruvala said, “With Lando, since such a young age, he has always been special, he has always been good at what he did. When we were in karting, he was probably only half my height at that time and he was already winning races.”
The former F2 driver has been in a similar crop of junior drivers as Norris. So, he knows the fierce competition that existed back in their junior days and Norris still stood out. Daruvala added, “He was definitely something special, you could see that when he was young and you do always have those special talents that always stand out and Lando was one of them.”
The Indian driver, who was himself a part of Red Bull’s young driver program, gave a tough fight to the McLaren star. Daruvala highlighted, “I did beat him quite a few times”.
Still, Norris’ future proved to be a lot brighter relative to Daruvala in terms of Formula 1. The 24-year-old got a shot with McLaren in 2019 itself. Meanwhile, the Red Bull junior struggled in F2 for four seasons from 2020 to 2023. Daruvala is currently racing in Formula E with the Maserati MSG team.
The contrasting fates of Lando Norris and Jehan Daruvala
Lando Norris capitalized on his opportunities brilliantly to earn his F1 debut as early as 2019. His junior career CV is quite decorated with multiple wins and championships and McLaren identified his talent perfectly. Jehan Daruvala on the other hand, didn’t raise as many eyebrows but certainly punched above his weight.
Coming from India, Daruvala was already exceeding expectations to compete in the junior formulas and get close to F1. Working with the Red Bull young drivers’ program and competing in a fierce F2 field, the 25-year-old strived hard to make some headway towards F1.
Although, when even champions of the junior series like Felipe Drugovich and Theo Pourchaire cannot get an F1 seat, Daruvala’s chances will be extremely slim. With the abundance of young drivers in F3 and F2, many drivers like him have to look for options elsewhere and abandon their F1 goals.
However, the Indian driver has made a smart call to go to Formula E and recalibrate his racing career in a non-F1 series. Even his junior peers like Dan Ticktum and Sacha Fenestraz are in the electric series. So, while Lando Norris scales his ambitions in the pinnacle of motorsport, Daruvala would want to excel in the Formula E world championship.
