Norris warns there's more to come: 'Weight off my shoulders'

The British driver was at a loss for words when speaking about how he felt after finishing in first place: "I don't know what I'm going to say, honestly, but just a lot of smiling, a lot of cheers, a lot of hard work goes into a day like today, but just happiness, me smiling, which is not always the case, but yes, I mean, I dream of these days sometimes and you never know when they're going to come towards you, but today was that day." 

"To get that first victory is always incredible. And I've of course had my moments where we've been close and I've never been able to convert it into the win. But I wasn't worried, like as much as a lot of people doubted that I was going to be able to put it together and win a race, I wasn't worried. I've kind of been more confident than ever this year that I've got what it takes, and the team have got what it takes. And I was patient with it." 

'I knew my time was coming'

Norris joined the grid in 2019, making his debut at the Australian Grand Prix. In that year, he was joined by two other rookies, fellow British driver George Russell, and now Williams driver Alex Albon. Out of the trio, only Albon is left to secure his first F1 win. Since joining, Norris has completed 110 races, finishing second in eight of them, and securing a total of fifteen podiums ahead of his first place. During his time, he has been paired with a variety of team-mates including Carlos Sainz, Daniel Ricciardo, and currently Oscar Piastri. 

"I knew my time was coming," said Norris before adding: " I said it this morning, like it's not often that I'm optimistic about things, but actually all weekend there's been something, like I already practice, qualifyings, we've been close."

"I said at the beginning of the year, we could win races. A lot of people doubted what I could say. And the fact that I said that, I think they doubted that McLaren could win races. They doubted that I could win races. But I was confident. I was, deep down I knew that we had our time coming. So the team had done an amazing job. We weren't even into Q2 here last year. So the fact we were on top, we won a race, the team had done an insane job to kind of go from where we were to where we are now."

'We're already hungry for more'

This weekend McLaren introduced ten upgrades to Norris' car, with 50% of these being added to his team-mate's. By Imola, Piastri will also have the same upgrades added to his car. For McLaren, this is just the start of their battle to beat the dominant Red Bull Racing. 

"I doubt it would have been a lot less likely that I won today without these upgrades and without the hard work that they've [the team] been putting into everything. So I would like to say it's the start. And now we're already hungry for more. But yeah, we'll keep our heads down. We'll keep pushing. And I'm sure we can be here a lot more with."