Racing Hearts - Lando Norris

(19)

y/n pov:

Pre-race testing went exactly the way the team hoped and now, a week after we were heading into the first race of the season - Bahrain.

The paddock was buzzing and excitement surged all around for the first night race of the season; all teams hoping to top the charts and get a lead; no one would back down and there was no room for mistakes.

Entering the Mclaren motorhome, my nerves were on all time high with just being here was a feeling that I couldn't describe in words. Will gave me a reassuring smile, " You'll do great Y/n," he had said earlier today, " Just keep your head held high and you'll find your way."

Well, I'm sure I'll find my way but currently there was something much more important to be found; actually it was a someone - Lando. Speaking of him, I think we both started to avoid eachother a bit since whatever happened the other day. Honestly, I myself don't know what happened and in addition whatever interaction we had was always work related. It was weird seeing him like that, so distressed and it seemed as though something was always bothering him. A feeling of uneasiness lapsing around us whenever we were together and no matter how well he thought he hid it behind that smile of his, there was something off about him. It just wasn't the same.

But, I didn't have time to think about all that, the main task at hand was searching for the boy. Qualifying was done and although we didn't get the result we hoped for with Oscar qualifying P8 while Lando P10; which was a tad bit disappointing considering the fact that Mclaren seemed to be one of the fastest in the free practice sessions. But, there were hopes for the race tomorrow.

At the moment, the group 2 of the drivers press conference was going to begin and here I was, running through the paddock trying to search for our driver who thought it would be a very good idea to disappear without telling anybody. I tried calling him but then remembered that his phone was with his race engineer. Searching through the paddock hoping to spot the papaya colour, I found myself bumping into Charles outside the Ferrari garage.

" Woah, hey!" he exclaimed, keeping his hands on my shoulders to keep me steady, " Where are you running off too?"

Panting, I caught my breath, " Have you seen Lando?"

Charles immediately smirked at my question receiving a smack to his arm in return, " Do you know where he is or not?"

" Geez, desperate much" he muttered, raising an eyebrow at him, he continued, " He's in the Ferrari garage."

Why the hell was he there?

It was as if Charles read the question right off my mind, " He's with Carlos." he answered, gesturing me to follow him in. Although, I was a bit hesitant and was really hoping that Charles would offer to call Lando out but again, I knew exactly what he was doing.

Getting quite a few confused looks from the mechanics all dressed in the famous Ferrari red, I tried not to mind it as we finally spotted Lando who seemed very busy with Carlos.

" Lando Norris." I snapped, maybe a little to loud considering that I earned confused looks from the people around as well as the two drivers; my tone instantly changed while greeting the Ferrari driver, " Carlos, hi, amazing qualifying. That was pretty good."

Giving him a smile, I turned towards Lando, who seemed to be staring at me with his eyebrows raised and arms crossed across his chest, " Where the hell have you been? You really think it was smart to just wander off without informing"

"Jeez Dell," he uttered, running his hands through his hair, "Chill. I'm not a small kid."

That was it, without allowing him to say another word, the boy was dragged out of the Ferrari garage and into the press conference.

--

" That's the last car taking it's place at the back of the grid." Martin Brundle's voice echoed through my headphones along with David Crofts as the lights began turning on one by one

" And that's lights out and away we go for the Bahrain grand prix."

Lap 1 : " Our pole sitter, Max Verstappen sure got a good launch of the line, didn't he Crofty?" Martin Brundle asked

" Of course!" Crofty beamed, " He had the fastest reaction time, his teammate was overtaken by Carlos Sainz into turn 1 but oh-" his voice was laced with astonishment as the replay of the race start was shown, " Would you look at that, Lando Norris lost 5 places at the start, looks like the young brit had issues with his launch. Definitely not how he was expecting his race to go."

Martin agreed, " You can hear him on the radio, not happy at all."

Lap 33-34 : Oscar and Lando entered the pits for their stop, with Oscar's pit stop going rather smoothly as compared to Lando.

" Oh! That's quite a slow pit stop for Mclaren. You can see the mechanics shaking their head, not a good sign." Crofty commented. My eyes darted outside, the frustration was evident; not only from Lando but from the team as well. Oscar was having a pretty good race with overtaking and gaining track position, seems like the strategy on his side was working well but for Lando, that was a whole different story.

Having lost a couple of places in the start, put him on the edge and then being undercut by the one of the Mercedes didn't help either; in addition to having a slow pit stop.

I could hear his race engineer, Will Joseph trying to clam him down but it didn't seem to land. This race was surely not going the way they expected it to.

Lap 49 : With less than 10 laps to go, racing was on.

Charles's Ferrari having overtaken his teammate was now hunting Max down for P1, meanwhile there was a huge gap between Checo in his Redbull and Oscar who seemed to be pretty comfortable in his P5, the position that he would most likely finish in.

Further behind was a different scene altogether, with Pierre in his Alpine running in P10, behind him was Lando and challenging the Mclaren driver was the Williams of Alex Albon. All 3 cars running within touching distance from eachother; which was surely entertaining to the huge number of fans who had come to watch the race.

Lap 52 : As the laps began running out, it was evident Lando was desperate to be in the points.

" Lando, have patience." Will Joseph, his race engineer told him as Crofty commented on the same, " Well, it is all about patience as put by Lando Norris's race engineer but we can definielty see the driver struggling. Not having a good qualifying and loosing track position right at the beginning sure has him gunning for that point."

My eyes darted to the screen in front of me, it was showing the replay of one of the overtakes that Oscar had done; suddenly there was a loud bang echoing throughout, followed by gasps and silence. Somebody had crashed.

" Lando Norris has crashed and he is out of the race." Crofty exclaimed as silence reverberated throughout the garage, " Fortunately, the driver is all okay and out of the car. Here's the replay of what happened."

Lando could be heard on his radio, cursing about what just happened. The replay showed him trying to overtaken the defending Alpine, although there wasn't enough space but he didn't back out resulting in him loosing control of the car as contact appeared to be evident and going straight into the barriers.

" Well as you can see, there definitely wasn't enough space." Crofty commented," That was a very risky overtake by the Mclaren driver and I'm sure the stewards will be looking into it but for now, Lando Norris is out of the Bahrain grand prix and looks like the race is going to end under a safety car."