Lando Norris may be hesitant to call his pole position at the Monaco Grand Prix a “breakthrough,” but he may be selling himself short.

The McLaren driver told media that he was “driving smarter,” not faster en route to setting a new track record.

Lando Norris explains his record-breaking Monaco GP pole

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Lando Norris‘ last pole position in Formula 1 came at the 2025 season opener, which he managed to convert into a commanding win in the Australian Grand Prix.

But since then, the McLaren driver has failed to score an additional pole position, and he hasn’t been able to snatch a win — leaving the championship lead open for his teammate Oscar Piastri to snag.

Norris has been extremely open about the fact that he’s found the F1 2025 season uniquely difficult, noting that he’s struggled to put all the necessary puzzle pieces together to assemble a complete race weekend since the start of the season.

In Monaco, those pieces look to be finally coming together — but Norris is hesitant to brand it a “breakthrough.”

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On Saturday afternoon, Lando Norris snatched a commanding pole position for the Monaco Grand Prix away from hometown driver Charles Leclerc in a frankly monster run that also saw him set a new track record of 1:09.954.

“I think to classify it as a breakthrough, I think you also need consistency of results,” Norris said to media, including PlanetF1.com, during the post-qualifying press conference in response to a question about what this pole signifies.

“I can look at it both ways,” he explained. I can see the positive: It’s a breakthrough that I just had a good Saturday, and for me, that’s at least a step in the right direction, which I’m very, very happy about.

“But it’s still one weekend, and I think, like I said, consistency is a big part of it, too, and I’ll be happier if I know, and I can get to that point where I’m confident in every session that I can perform like I did today, because I think my performance was at a very, very strong level.

“So if we go into Barcelona and we go into Canada and the next few tracks, and I can consistently perform at this level, then that’s our goal. That’s my goal.

“So, yes — our goal, because it’s me and my team.

“But certainly today was a step in the right direction, and that’s all I need for now.”

It’s that consistency that has eluded Norris thus far this season. His commanding performance in Australia seemed to fizzle away as the year progressed.

While he displayed an overall improvement in performance from 2024, there was always one small issue that caught him out: A poor start of a Grand Prix, a bad line through a corner in qualifying, a tangle with another driver.

By contrast, his teammate Oscar Piastri was largely flawless, with the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix serving as the first sign of weakness in the Australian’s championship run.

But what transformed Norris’ Saturday in Monaco? Was it solely his own improvement as a driver? Or was it all down to improvements in the car?

Norris explained, “It’s probably a small mix of both of these: Things from the car, just it being Monaco and a very different layout, a very different kind of style of driving that’s needed here.

“It’s a lot more risk commitment rather than just absolute car balance in a way, and also things that I’ve been working on to improve, to do a better job.

“Not because I’ve not had the pace; just more putting it together come Q3.

“Today was probably the first time since Australia that I’ve really put it all together. It’s not like I’m driving quicker; it’s [that] I’m driving in a better way, in a smarter way.

“But there’s been a lot of work that’s gone on, so for me, I mean, even if I was pole in any other track, I think it probably would have been the pole that’s meant the most to me. It probably means even more that it’s in Monaco, but more because of what’s happened over the last couple of months.

“It may not seem like a lot, but for me, it’s quite a big thing.”

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