Following Hamilton's record-breaking 92^nd Grand Prix victory in Portugal last October, Norris said that Hamilton was “just doing the job” as he is "in a car which should win every race" and "has to beat one or two other drivers, that's it."

After a rather disappointing race in Portimao, where Norris crashed with Lance Stroll, leaving his McLaren with damages that costed him precious points, the 21-years-old British driver was a bit heated in the post-race interviews. When asked about his compatriot making history for Britain by  registering 92 wins in Formula One, the highest ever mark in the sport, Norris said: “I’m just happy for him, nothing more. It doesn’t mean anything to me, really. He’s in a car which should win every race, basically.”

A few days after his press conference comments, Norris publicly apologized on his Twitter account, saying he was "careless" and never meant to cause any offence towards the fellow Briton, who he also messaged privately about the issue.

Now, almost three months after that episode, Lando Norris returned on the matter and expressed how he found the resentment over his words a bit tricky to deal with, given Hamilton was one of the drivers he looked up the most among his peers.

"There's no-one I probably respect more in the paddock than Lewis and what he's done. I've got one podium, so it's not like I can talk and say he's not doing a good job, because I know how hard it is to get a podium in the first place.” Norris told Autosport.com

Norris, together with Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc and George Russell is probably among the most promising young drivers currently on the grid, he has shown his talent and his improvements over the last two seasons; and despite always being described as the funny and nice one in the paddock, he also says he tries to “speak a bit of the truth sometimes, and say what is true, and sometimes people don't like that”.

The young British driver, however, highlights that he never meant to hurt anyone with his words, "my comments, and my comments always within Formula 1, will never be to take anything away from a driver or disrespect what they've been able to achieve”.

"Maybe I say some bad things sometimes, and it gets portrayed in the wrong way, or maybe I just say something I shouldn't. […] But it's just because I'm a human and everyone makes mistakes sometimes”.

The McLaren talent has been one of the most entertaining and active drivers on social media, having rarely caused any controversy through his words or actions. However, he believes that people’s reactions to his comments might be caused by how the media portray him.

As a matter of fact, he assumes that if some other driver, such as Kimi Raikkonen, made a similar statement to his, people wouldn’t have reacted the same way "Yes, I think if Kimi had said it, people would have loved it”.

"There's nothing you can do about that, that's just how people portray you. I guess I've come in and I have been the jokey guy and perhaps not as serious as I should have been, and I feel like I've done a better job with that”.

People perhaps forget that racing drivers, no matter how young or funny they can be, are still professional athletes and they always want to beat their rivals, "I guess people have just never seen the bad side of me or the angry side of me, and then when I have shown that, people just think I'm acting out in a bad way and I'm disrespecting everyone, which I'm not”.

A whole lot of other drivers “say this kind of things a lot of the time”, Norris added, but just because people are used to it, they find it normal.

"A bit of the reason is I've generally been seen as a bit of a nice guy and so on, and when I say something a bit more aggressive or offensive in some ways, and people just see that as a contrasted side of myself.

"That's just the way it is. It's not something I can just change, it's just people's perceptions of different people."