This Sunday, Lando Norris became Formula 1 world champion, for the first – and, I believe, for the last – time. There was a lot of emotion, a lot of tears, a lot of hugs and champagne and everything that a victory is entitled to except, perhaps, merit. The Briton won because the score dictated it, but everyone knows, him included, that he wasn’t the best driver of the season. Norris is not even the second best driver on the grid.
As a victory is not made alone, the young Englishman was lucky to have the best car since the beginning of the season – finishing the championship in an inexplicable third place, after a Grand Prix where he did not go beyond fourth position – and to have the best teammate he could ask for. Oscar Piastri is the best driver, but he plays as a team, which was essential for Norris’ title. Because managing to not reach the podium with the best car in the race is not for everyone.
For those who don’t follow the sport, it’s important to know this: the four-time champion – and current best driver on the grid – Max Verstappen, had a difference of more than 100 points over Lando Norris. In Sunday’s race, if Norris had finished fourth, Verstappen would have secured his fifth world championship title, after a resounding recovery at the end of the season, despite driving, throughout the season, a car that clearly did not want to help him.
A world champion who, having the best car, cannot maintain a substantial difference from other competitors is clearly a fallacy. As is currently the case in several areas, Lando’s victory seems to reinforce the theory that it is not whoever is better who wins, but rather whoever is “smarter”. Who can get through the raindrops, using others – in this case, the team, the running partner and luck – to get to a place that, in fact, doesn’t belong to them. As with companies, with national and world leaders, with managers, currently the world seems to be organized for an intense democratization of success and victory. As if everyone had the right to taste them. Unfortunately, they don’t – and all you need to do is read some books on History and Politics, if you’re not paying attention to the present moment, to know that this democratization of mediocrity always gives bad results.
Of course, Lando Norris winning a Formula 1 championship does not, in itself, bring enormous harm to the world – apart from the fact that it shows young people that sports are often games of luck. After all, Portugal also became European football champion in 2016, without being the best team on the field.
But as a colleague of mine rightly pointed out on Sunday, as soon as the race started: “Lando being world champion, finishing third (how this is going to end…) will be one of the best metaphors for the society we have created today”. One where ability, work, effort and performance are clearly losing ground to popularity, luck and the increasingly evident lack of critical sense.