Nico Rosberg has admitted to being surprised by Lando Norris risking his dominant triumph in last Sunday’s Singapore Grand Prix when several contacts with the wall nearly ended the McLaren driver’s charge.
Norris dominated the race at Marina Bay from start to finish, pulling out a commanding 22-second lead by the time the chequered flag dropped.
However, despite his comfortable position, Norris appeared to leave himself very little margin, the Briton running wide multiple times and suffering three significant blows with the wall, suggesting a lack of caution.
Speaking on this week’s Sky Sports F1 podcast, Rosberg questioned Norris' need to push so hard while maintaining a significant lead.
“For me, it kind of baffled me a little bit what was going on there,” commented the 2016 F1 World Champion.
“Because he hit the wall twice and both were like really severe, almost race-ending moments where he was quite lucky not to DNF.”
Rosberg detailed the incidents, pointing out just how risky they were.
“Once, he went miles off the track in a hairpin out-braking [himself] – but really not a small out-braking, like a massive out-braking – and the other time he hit the same wall that George Russell hit last year, where he went crashing out on the last lap of the race last year.
“And what you maybe don’t remember, is he went off the track again when he was passing a backmarker, which was a Williams, he went off the track again.”
Rosberg emphasized how strange it was to see Norris, in such a dominant position, making such mistakes.
“So there’s three moments here, and that’s so strange,” he added. “Like, I can’t remember myself, or a Max Verstappen or whatever, or Lewis [Hamilton], when leading so comfortably with like 30 seconds [advantage] making three major mistakes like that.
“That was a bit strange.”
While acknowledging the physical and mental toll that the race takes on drivers, Rosberg still found Norris' errors surprising.
“I mean, I know Singapore is so hard [for] concentration,” the German conceded. “Physically, it’s so so tough, but I don’t know what it’s down to.
“But we know that from Lando, that he tends to make those little errors all the time, everywhere.
“We’ve seen that from him, and he needs to iron that out if he wants to fight for the championship this year.”
Despite the incidents, Norris’ victory brought him closer to Max Verstappen in the championship standings, reducing the gap to 52 points with six rounds left, starting with the United States Grand Prix.
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