McLaren driver Lando Norris was the victim of abhorrent abuse on Twitch this week as he received a death threat from a viewer.
Norris was streaming with fellow Quadrant Esports member Max Fewtrell, and the pair were enjoying casual conversation before the Briton stumbled across a disgusting message aimed at him.
“Wow I just got a message from someone saying ‘I hope you die,” he said during the stream.
“Wow bro, that’s deep,” he added.
“Well that’s pretty s*** isn’t it?” replied Fewtrell.
The 22-year-old took the moral high ground over the lowlife, and sent his best regards.
“I hope he… lives,” replied the McLaren driver.
“I was really concerned about what you were going to say there,” added Fewtrell, impressed at his compatriot’s composure.
Norris has been extremely open about his mental struggles in the past, particularly during his first year in the sport.
“I guess people, when you just watch TV, don’t realise many things that a driver goes through,” Norris said on This Morning on ITV last year.
However, series like Drive to Survive on Netflix have given fans a clearer perspective on what drivers and team members go through emotionally and physically throughout a season of racing.
“It’s a bit of a shame but there’s more programmes now where you get to see what the driver is like behind the scenes, and the amount of pressure and stress that they have to cope with,” he affirmed.
The McLaren driver out-qualified team-mate Carlos Sainz 11-10 during his first season, and finished 11th in the Drivers’ Standings having scored points on 11 occasions.
Despite a hugely respectable rookie year, Norris does not conceal the fact that he spent large parts of 2019 worrying for his future if things did not work out in Formula 1.
“Especially at my age, coming into Formula 1 at 19, there’s a lot of eyes of you. So dealing with all these kind of things, that took its toll on me,” he explained.
“[I was] feeling like, I don’t know what’s next, if this goes wrong, if I don’t go out in the next session and perform, what’s the outcome of all of this?
“Am I going to be in Formula 1 next year? If I’m not, what am I going to do? Because I’m not really good at many other things in life.
“So just all of that, and then feeling a depressed a lot of time that if I have a bad weekend I just think, I’m not good enough and things like that.”
In 2020, McLaren partnered with Mind, a mental health charity, and they have since sold merchandise around the campaign with all proceeds going to the charity.
They also donated £285,000 to them at the end of 2020, while Norris and team-mate Daniel Ricciardo designed special merchandise last year.