Norris highlights impact of missed opportunities in F1 title fight

Lando Norris has underlined the effect missed opportunities and failure to execute has had on his F1 drivers' championship fight with Max Verstappen this season.

The 24-year-old trails the Dutchman by 78 points heading into the final 10 rounds, with 284 still on offer.

In an exclusive interview with RacingNews365, the McLaren driver says that whilst he is "still in the fight", he needs to improve to confidently be "in with a chance" of taking the title.

However, despite the mathematical possibility, it is a significant deficit to overhaul. The gap is currently double the size Sebastian Vettel recovered from against Fernando Alonso in 2012, which is the outright record for largest championship comeback in F1 history.

Whilst performances for Norris and McLaren have been strong, there is a sense that points have been left on the table.

Over the past seven rounds, Verstappen has further extended his championship lead, outscoring the British driver 116 points to 98. To add insult to injury, his team-mate Oscar Piastri has scored 114 over that period and it is also three points fewer than Norris scored in the opening seven rounds.

If he is going to meaningfully reduce the gap to the Red Bull driver and make the drivers' title fight interesting over the final 10 rounds, he will need to do it quickly coming out of the summer break - something he is acutely aware of.

"Yes, more than what I have at the minute," he replies when it is put to him that he will need to have perfect weekends moving forward.

"So even though I'm still in the fight and that kind of thing, I need to still improve that bit more in order to confidently say: 'I'm in with a chance.'"

'It's like four opportunities...'

To Norris, that failure to execute, and the missed opportunities that stem from it, is multifaceted. 

On one side, there have been mistakes of his own making - or moments down to his own agency, such as the performance in the early stages of races and his battle with Verstappen at the Austrian Grand Prix.

A growing narrative in F1 is that the one-time grand prix winner struggles with race starts. On the five occasions he has started either a grand prix or sprint from pole, he has never finished the first lap in the lead.

At the round prior to the summer break, at Spa-Francorchamps, Norris started fourth but fell to seventh after running wide at the first corner, and with that lost any chance of fighting for a podium or more.

Verstappen, who started P11, was on his tail within three laps and ultimately finished ahead of him, further extending his championship lead.

On the other hand, there have been times where McLaren as a team has not optimised strategy or made decisions that have cost Norris points.

Taken together, they have prevented the British driver from adding a second grand prix victory and likely caused a not insignificant swing towards Verstappen in the drivers' fight.

"I think at the minute, both from my side, on not having the best starts, and also from a team side, which is a bit more down to say Canada [and] Silverstone," Norris admits.

"It's like four opportunities to score maybe 25 more points, or something. And, as much as that's 25 more, that's also for Max 15, 20 less.

"It's cleaning up those and winning when I should, basically."