Zak Brown, who took the reins of McLaren in 2018, reached one of his primary goals Sunday when Lando Norris won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix – the victory clinching the 2024 Formula 1 Constructors’ Championship. It was McLaren’s first constructors’ title since 1998 and the tenth in the organization’s history, second only to Ferrari.
The ebullient CEO has been not only the leader of the company’s motorsports effort but also its public face and cheerleader. His promoting Italian engineer Andre Stella to Team Principal solidified McLaren’s resurgence to the sharp end of the grid.
With McLaren leading Ferrari by 21 points coming into the season finale in Abu Dhabi, it looked very good for the Woking team with Norris and teammate Oscar Piastri claiming the front row in qualifying. The team’s quiet confidence lasted for the first quarter mile of the race. That’s when Piastri was spun out by a lunging Max Verstappen, and Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz slipped through to second behind Norris.
It was tense from there to the finish for Zak Brown as Ferrari pilot Charles LeClerc moved from deep in the field to third making it imperative that Norris continue to hold point. Any difficulty for the race-leading McLaren would hand the constructors’ title to Ferrari.
“What an awesome team effort,” Brown said on the Sky Sports / ESPN telecast “Amazing! That was stressful!”
“That was the most miserable two hours of my life,” Brown later said while awaiting the trophy ceremony where he took to the podium with Norris to accept the constructors’ victory trophy.
