Norris handed the harsh verdict no title hopeful wants to hear

With back-to-back victories in Hungary and Zandvoort, Norris has climbed to fourth in the drivers' standings, closing in on George Russell and Lewis Hamilton ahead of him. However, he remains 83 points adrift of championship leader Kimi Antonelli, who has won just one of the last six races but continues to collect points with remarkable consistency.

However, Speaking on the Red Flags podcast, the former Haas team principal dismissed Norris as a real threat despite his recent run. In Steiner's view, the McLaren driver has found his strongest form too late in the season, with the championship gap now too large to realistically overcome.

Steiner also believes Mercedes remains in a sufficiently strong position to protect its advantage. Although the team is not completely dominant, he pointed to its overall competitiveness and the way it can manage its two drivers through team orders as factors that make Norris' task even more difficult.

Norris is taking inspiration from Max Verstappen's 2025 title charge as he looks to mount a similar comeback this season. For the Briton, the main lesson from Verstappen's fightback is simply that a significant championship deficit can still be overturned, giving him reason to keep believing and pushing both himself and McLaren until the title is mathematically out of reach.

However, he does not believe Verstappen necessarily produced anything that McLaren was incapable of matching last season. Instead, he pointed to mistakes made by the team at various stages of the campaign, while also highlighting a major difference between the two situations. McLaren had two drivers fighting each other for the championship, whereas Red Bull's challenge centred entirely around Verstappen.

Norris sees some parallels between McLaren's situation in 2025 and the position Mercedes finds itself in this year, while his own circumstances are closer to those Verstappen faced during his comeback. Rather than attempting to replicate a particular aspect of the Dutchman's approach, Norris intends to use his 2025 charge as proof that a title fight can remain alive even when the odds appear to be against him.