A stand-out moment in Norris’ quest for greatness?

Sometimes it’s the little things, the small but significant details both in and out of the car, that mark the potential greatness of a Formula 1 driver.

The finest example of that in recent times came in Azerbaijan in 2019, when after his crash in Q2 Charles Leclerc returned not to his driver room to beat himself up in private, but to the Ferrari garage.

As qualifying continued without him, there Leclerc stood side by side, shoulder to shoulder – in full view of the cameras – with his team to watch the remainder of the session.

A likely candidate for pole position until his error entering Baku’s castle section, Leclerc only had himself to blame and his mistake, as he repeatedly told himself over the radio after hitting the barrier, was stupid.

But in losing Leclerc also kind of won, his very public display of unity and togetherness endearing him to the team just that little bit more as he stole the Scuderia’s hearts from Sebastian Vettel, his four-time World Champion team-mate.

The little things can reveal a lot about a driver’s character and outlook, and so it seemed in the immediate aftermath of Lando Norris’s race-ending collision with Pierre Gasly in last weekend’s Miami Grand Prix.

Game. Face. On. @LandoNorris

Barcelona pic.twitter.com/M5qRAlvVfv

— McLaren (@McLarenF1) May 9, 2022

After the right-rear of his AlphaTauri took a hit from Fernando Alonso – in the midst of one of his impetuous days – on the previous lap, Gasly was still in the process of examining the full extent of the damage on Lap 40 when he came to be passed by Mick Schumacher, Kevin Magnussen and Norris.

As Gasly, visibly struggling to keep his car on the road, ran wide through two consecutive corners, he was passed by the Haas drivers into Turn 8