Lando Norris left ‘shocked’ by Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari for one reason at the Australian Grand Prix

McLaren driver Lando Norris has started the season in the perfect way as he chases his first world championship.

The Australian Grand Prix threw everything at the 20 drivers on the grid but it was Lando Norris who came out on top.

McLaren proved to have the fastest car in testing and that carried over into the first race weekend of the campaign, despite Norris and the rest of his team trying to downplay expectations.

McLaren will feel they could have achieved a one-two in Australia were it not for Oscar Piastri who was unfortunately caught out by the final downpour of the race.

However, for Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton, their first race working together didn’t go to plan.

Hamilton struggled with his radio communications as he got used to working alongside Riccardo Adami and ended up finishing P10.

Norris, despite that, found one reason to be ‘shocked’ by Ferrari’s performance that has made him very wary going into the Chinese Grand Prix.

READ MORE: McLaren driver Lando Norris’ life outside F1 from parents to celebration

Lando Norris ‘shocked’ by Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton’s race pace

Norris was asked in the official pre-race press conference about how the first race weekend of the 2025 season played out.

Reflecting on McLaren and Ferrari’s performance, he said: “Our goal was to be quickest and we were there.

“But we expected Ferrari to be right there, and they were seven, eight-tenths off.

“Their race pace on the Friday was even better than ours almost. We were shocked, they seemed shocked…”

Norris was then asked about working alongside Oscar Piastri who signed a new contract before the opening Grand Prix of the year.

He explained: “It helps having a good teammate to learn from, it is something the other teams don’t have, we have both been at McLaren a few years now and it is two drivers working well, not one.”

READ MORE: Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton’s life outside F1 from net worth to family

Lewis Hamilton searching for positives after frustrating Australian Grand Prix

Hamilton made it clear when he first joined Ferrari that he would need time to adapt to his new surroundings.

Ferrari saw Hamilton spend countless hours at their factory over the winter as he got to grips with his new team and the brand new systems that the Scuderia have in place compared to Mercedes.

However, the most important thing for Hamilton is spending time in the car and three days of testing in Bahrain isn’t sufficient for completely understanding the SF-25.

He admitted after qualifying where he only set the eighth-quickest time that he had never driven the car in the wet before.

All the rookies and other drivers who switched teams were in the same position and it’s no coincidence that five of the six racers who hit the barriers were taking part in their first Grand Prix for a new outfit.

Hamilton had some complaints about his Ferrari at the beginning of the race weekend in Australia but will quickly get up to speed with the car over the coming races.

However, it’s yet to be seen whether they have the raw pace to compete with McLaren, Red Bull and Mercedes.

If they don’t, then Ferrari will have to switch focus to 2026 early but that’s not going to be an easy pill for Hamilton to swallow.