Papaya rules! Flawless Norris powers McLaren to first title in 26 years

Wowee. McLaren has clinched its first F1 constructors’ title since 1998, after Lando Norris backed up pole position in qualifying with a lights-flag-victory at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

The team had lined up for the race in complete control, having locked out the front row of the grid with the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc demoted down to P19 because of a penalty.

But by the end of the first lap Oscar Piastri was plum last - the victim of an over-ambitious lunge from Max Verstappen, for which the four-time champ was hit with a 10-second penalty - and Leclerc was up to P8 having gained eleven places.

Piastri was then given a 10-second penalty of his own for running into the back of Franco Colapinto’s Williams, and after spending a large portion of the race unable to pass the Aston of Fernando Alonso, P10 was the best he could do.

That heaped the pressure on Norris, because had he slipped to second behind Carlos Sainz, Leclerc’s heroic podium effort would’ve left both teams level on points and hung the fate of the championship on… the fastest lap point. Can you imagine?

However, it never came to that. The 25-year-old Briton drove immaculately throughout, easing away from the chasing Sainz early on and making none of the small errors that ultimately derailed his own drivers’ title fight with Verstappen.

With no late safety car drama to shake things up at the end, Norris cruised to his fourth win and McLaren’s sixth of the season, ending a dry spell in the constructors’ that dates back to the days of Mika Hakkinen… when neither of its current drivers had been born.

Its only success in the interim was in 2008, when a certain Lewis Hamilton won his maiden championship. And as Norris led the way in Abu Dhabi, Hamilton was delivering a rousing drive of his own, recovering from P16 in his final race with Mercedes to snatch fourth away from teammate George Russell with a ballsy move on the very last lap. What a way to sign off.

Meanwhile, everyone at McLaren was in raptures. “Woo hoo hoo! Woo! Papaya on top!” screeched Lando over the radio. “Incredible. Well done everyone, so proud of you all. Thank you so much, it’s been a special year. Next year’s gonna be my year too.”

McLaren finished on 666 points, with Ferrari just 14 behind on 652. Victory ties it with Williams on nine titles (behind only Ferrari on 16), and makes it just the second team this side of the millennium to win the constructors’ as an engine customer. The other? Brawn. Both powered by Mercedes, by the way.

It caps a stunning turnaround for the Woking team, which as recently as March 2023 had arguably the slowest car on the grid having missed its development targets that winter.

But since then McLaren’s rise up the grid has been emphatic: by the summer of ‘23 the team was second only to Red Bull for pace, and no-one finished runner-up to Verstappen more often than Norris that year.

At the start this season Red Bull appeared to have maintained its advantage as Verstappen won seven of the opening 10 grands prix, but after Norris took his maiden F1 win in Miami in May, it was the McLaren that most often looked like the strongest car.

And with Sergio Perez suffering an inexplicable loss of form, the papaya team began to grind down a deficit that at one stage stood at 115 points, as Red Bull’s campaign haemorrhaged points to its rivals.

Piastri’s superb win in Baku in September completed the chase, and although Ferrari was never far behind, ultimately McLaren proved slightly quicker and more consistent over the 24-race contest.

The final five races of this season have been won by four different teams, and with the rules set to stay the same in 2025, next year is shaping up to be an all-timer. Here’s hopin’. See you there.