Norris has no sympathy for Ricciardo over McLaren departure

Lando Norris says he has no sympathy for teammate Daniel Ricciardo, with the Australian having struggled badly at McLaren this season.

Ricciardo has just 19 points to Norris' 76 as the 2022 F1 season resumes with this weekend's Belgian Grand Prix, and earlier this week it was announced that he will be leaving McLaren at the end of the season, despite his contract still having a year to run.

"I hate to say it, but I would say no," Norris told media, including RacingNews365.com, when asked if he had any sympathy for Ricciardo's current predicament.

"People will probably hate me for saying it but it's difficult, because I never know if I might encounter that in the future with this car, or with a different team or whatever, so I never want to contradict myself going into the future, but I've just got to focus on my driving.

"It's not my job to focus on someone else, and I'm not a driver coach, I'm not here to help and do those kinds of things.

"I'm here to perform at my absolute best and that's about it, so it's difficult when people start to have an expectation that it's my job to also do these other things, when that's not really the case.

"It's also the case that if I don't perform well for a few years then it can also be the end of my career, the end of me driving in Formula 1, so I've got to focus on myself for the majority of it.

"Every driver has to adapt to the scenarios that they're in, and that's what I feel like I've had to do."

Norris: Ricciardo was quicker at the start of 2022

Despite their contrasting fortunes since, Norris added that Ricciardo had started the season as the quicker of the two McLarens, with the Briton having to work harder to adapt his driving style to the new generation of F1 cars.

"It's not a car that I've just been able to jump in and feel like I can just flow with and perform exactly like I want," Norris said of McLaren's 2022 challenger, the MCL36.

"At the beginning of the year, Daniel was performing better than I was – in the pre-season tests and stuff.

"It looked like he could just go out naturally and drive the car how he wanted to, and I had to start to learn a new way of driving compared to how I'd been used to driving the car for the last few years.

"So I feel like I've had to do a job of adapting and so has he, but I don't feel like you would have to have sympathy for [another driver] because they have not been able to do as good of a job."