Despite Max Verstappen calling it a “challenging” season, Lando Norris reckons it was actually a “relatively easy” for the four-time World Champion given McLaren’s slow start.

Verstappen secured his fourth successive Drivers’ Championship title under the lights in Las Vegas on Saturday night, his P5 handing him an unassailable 63-point lead over Norris.

Lando Norris sends ‘massive congrats’ to Max Verstappen

Additional reporting by Elizabeth Blackstock

After back-to-back clashes in Austin and Mexico between the title rivals, the writing was on the wall when Verstappen broke his winless streak with an emphatic P1 at the Brazilian Grand Prix where he raced from 17th on the grid to take the win by almost 20 seconds. That win was his first in 11 Grands Prix.

It had Verstappen speaking of a “tough run” and a “challenging season” as he celebrated title number four in Sin City having finished the Las Vegas GP in fifth place.

However, if you ask Norris, McLaren actually made it easy for Red Bull given they were late to the championship party.

“I think he’s still had a relatively easy season,” he told the media including PlanetF1.com. “I think if we had a better car at the beginning of the year, we would have been fighting him a lot more, and he would have been a lot more under pressure than he’s ever been.

“So I think we put him under pressure as soon as we did. He made mistakes, and it showed the team made mistakes, he made some mistakes, but over the course of the season that’s very few in terms of what he’s done.

“And that’s what makes him so good. You know, he’s not had a bad qualifying, he’s not had a bad race – I think his worst race was probably what, Budapest or something, and he still finished, what, fifth?

“So you know he just gets everything out of the car every time. And that’s always impressive to see. Always things to learn.”

Easy or not though, Norris applauded Verstappen’s efforts in 2024 as the Dutchman once again showed near perfection.

“Massive congrats to him,” he added. “He’s deserved it, he’s not put a foot wrong, really, the whole year.

“So that’s a strength of his, he has no downsides, he has no negatives. When he has had the quickest car, he’s dominated races. When he’s not in the quickest car, he’s still been just behind us and almost winning the races anyway.

“He’s just not had a bad side to him. He’s not had any bad races the whole year. His worst was something like a fifth. He just drove as Max has always driven, which is perfectly and can’t fault him anywhere.”