McLaren driver Lando Norris insisted that he was happy to be an advocate for mental health, saying that he was proud to be a pioneer for it.
Norris’ debut season in 2019 was critically acclaimed, but few knew of the deeper details of it at the time. He had been going through mental health struggles back then, and it affected him on multiple levels.
Since then, the Englishman has been vocal about the issue, and has used multiple platforms to spread awareness regarding it. Together with teammate Daniel Ricciardo and McLaren, he has also worked for Mind, the team’s mental health charity.
Norris insisted that he was happy to be an advocate for mental health, and expressed his pride in being an inspiration to many.
“I think, first of all, I’m very happy to see more and more people speaking out about it,” he told the official F1 website.
“And realising it’s only going to benefit them and benefit others; I don’t think there’s any negatives, really, from doing so: it’s only going to help you get better and it’s only going to help if you have a big following, if you have a lot of people watching or whatever it is, you’re only going to help people who are also struggling.”
Happiness
“So first of all I’m very happy, I’m proud to be part of that group of people who have accepted it and are happy and confident to speak out about it,” the youngster continued.
“And I think one of the biggest things which allowed me or made me think it’s a very good thing to speak out about it is my fans, my followers.
“It’s basically when I would hint at it, for example the first few times, before I was speaking about it publicly, a few of them saying it’s helping them or the impact it had on them – and over time raising the impact I can have on those thousands of people is huge.”
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