There can be no shocks as to who won Formula 1‘s Driver of the Day award with 41.15% of the vote as Lando Norris stole the show on his way to his first maiden win as he stunned the crowd at the 2024 Miami Grand Prix by beating Max Verstappen in a straight fight.
Norris‘s effort prior to the deployment of the safety car might have been enough to earn him the prize as he produced some blistering lap times to overcut Sergio Perez‘s Red Bull after lacking the straight-line speed needed to pass the Mexican despite appearing to be much faster.
But then the race was flipped on its head when Kevin Magnussen decided he wanted to crash one more time this weekend, taking out Logan Sargeant in the process, to deploy the safety car allowing McLaren to box the British driver to give him the true lead of the pack.
When the lights were extinguished and Bernd Maylander pulled the car back into the pit lanes, the man with 110 race starts executed the restart perfectly to make sure he kept Verstappen behind into Turn 1 before he pushed on to create a safety car buffer.
From there, he expertly controlled the race and extended his gap as Norris‘s chances of victory evolved from a prospect to a certainty as he build up an eight-second gap to the Red Bull behind with McLaren crossing all of their fingers to hope another safety car didn’t come out.
It didn’t, so Norris took the chequered flag a long way clear of anyone else to realise one of his F1 dreams by taking his maiden win, becoming the first driver to beat Verstappen in a straight fight since Perez at the 2023 Azerbaijan GP and just the second since Charles Leclerc won the 2022 Austrian GP.
More from the Singapore GP
Catch up with Total Motorsport's latest Singapore GP coverage, including Max Verstappen's victory at Marina Bay, Ferrari's costly strategy gamble, the full race classification, and the updated 2026 Formula 1 Drivers' and Constructors' Championship standings.
Norris exercises the demons of his past
Lando Norris was firmly on the same path as Jenson Button all those years ago as constant misfortune made it seem as though he might never ever win a race, with the pain manifesting the most at the 2021 Russian GP.
Back in Sochi, Norris had the race under control too before late rain completely threw the order out of the window and amidst confusion with his race engineer he rejected to pit for intermediates whilst Lewis Hamilton did.
Hamilton then caught up to him and took the lead of the race, leaving Norris devastated as he didn’t even get a podium despite such a strong weekend from him.
Now he can leave that behind as he climbed to the top-step for the first time ever in the top class of motor-racing, in what will take a lot of pressure off his shoulders going forwards.
