Lando Norris just grabbed back-to-back wins at Zandvoort, and now Jolyon Palmer's making a pretty spicy claim about the McLaren driver. Palmer reckons that despite not being in the thick of the championship battle, Norris deserves the driver of the season award. Look, it's a hot take, but Palmer's reasoning actually makes proper sense when you dive into it.

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Palmer broke down his reasoning on the F1 post-race show, pointing out that Norris has been delivering absolutely brilliant performances throughout 2026. The thing is, earlier in the season McLaren's car wasn't competitive enough to show it. Now that the team's brought upgrades and finally given him machinery that can fight at the front, Norris has been relentless. Palmer's impressed by how he's extracting every last bit from the car and how he keeps finding that extra tenth week after week. The gap between Lando and Oscar Piastri shows just how hard Norris is working to maximize what he's got.

What really stood out to Palmer was how Norris battled through the Dutch GP. When Andrea Kimi Antonelli jumped ahead at the start, Norris didn't panic. He was aggressive in the middle stint, pushing hard despite running in dirty air, then absolutely dominated the final laps to cruise to another victory. That's the kind of performance that screams class, Palmer reckoned.

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Here's where it gets interesting though. Palmer pointed out that while McLaren had early-season struggles with reliability, they weren't nearly as damaging as what Mercedes has dealt with. Antonelli's lost more championship points through reliability issues than Norris ever did. Double DNFs in China, missed points across multiple races, and crucially, he lost what looked like wins at Silverstone and Barcelona. That's massive compared to what McLaren's gone through.

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With Kimi Antonelli still leading the championship and George Russell hunting him down, Norris's title odds look long. But Palmer's making it clear that driver of the season isn't about who wins the championship. It's about who's performed best against the odds, and right now that's Norris delivering masterclass after masterclass.

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