Success breeds confidence, which we all know in motorsport.
But when labels such as 'favourite' start to also be applied, when does confidence maybe start to become complacency?
Never, in the case of Nissan, which at present with its star turn Oliver Rowland - who has now won three of the last five E-Prixs - feels like a shoo-in for a crack at taking home the silverware in 2025.
While one of those wins was last season's finale on his home patch in London, the two most recent ones in Mexico City and Jeddah have at the very least meant the stitching of a favourite tag has started to be applied to his red and white Nissan overalls, and that is completely justified on the evidence of the first four races.
"I don't mind [the favourite tag]," Rowland tells The Race.
"For me, it's really straightforward. I have my goals before every race with my sports psychologist. The goals are the same. We go out there and we have realistic goals.
"If one weekend I'm not the fastest, then I'm eighth, so be it. Then I try to get through to the duels and score some points in the race. And any better than that is a bonus."
That's amusing in a sense because so far this season Rowland hasn't even dropped so much as a hint of not making the duels in qualifying, nor being anywhere near eighth place - bar his Sao Paulo season-opener disaster that left him out of the points.
Such is his and Nissan's form that Rowland's claim actually reads as a bit disingenuous, but you get his drift and overall approach to addressing the way he and Nissan are succeeding just now.
Rowland started engaging with his sports psychologist, Jonathan Smith, who has worked extensively with Olympians and Paralympians, relatively recently.
He got that connection via his mentorship and management of Red Bull Formula 1 protege Arvid Lindblad, who has created a not-dissimilar buzz in his karting and early single-seater success as Rowland's good friend Max Verstappen did over a decade ago.
There was no desperate need for Rowland to start working with a psychologist, rather it was a tidy addition to his pre-event preparation. There is absolutely no evidence at present that this was anything other than a good decision.
Practically you can see tangible evidence of it. A little case study:
In the opening laps of Saturday's second Jeddah race, Rowland got nibbled at by an aggressive DS Penske of his old nemesis Jean-Eric Vergne. The driver who Rowland engaged in ferocious and extremely marginal combat with so memorably at Shanghai last June was up for a scrap. Rowland effectively let it go.
"He came round the outside, which I was fine with, but there was also a Kiro [Dan Ticktum], I think, sticking his nose on the inside and I was a bit unsure," recalls Rowland.
"I was looking at him, looking at him [Vergne] and then he turned across and actually we made a bit of contact, my wheel was dragged into his so I couldn't turn away from him. Luckily it was OK in the end, but we made a little bit of contact. But that was the point in the race where I said, 'I'm out of here, I'm going to the front'."
So, while there was no retaliation in the air, Rowland - knowing he had the situation in hand - went on the offensive in a more positive way.
"It's not efficient to get involved in these scraps," he adds.
"It's dangerous and not efficient, so it didn't make sense. Whilst I was taking a double slipstream it was amazing, but then everybody wanted to be in my place.
"So, they all came barking at my heels. [Sam] Bird hit me in the last corner again and then I said, 'I have the advantage, I go to the front, I survive'. Because I was kind of saying 'I'm going to go to the front, if I'm a bit down on energy and I finish fifth, not a problem. Just not a DNF, basically'."
The perspective of a future champion? Call it what you will, but it's a portentous new weapon that Rowland has found and is activating as well as his raw pace and overall management of races, of which he is vocal as a leader.
It’s lost on some how much Rowland leads the strategy of the races he runs. It's not through a cheap thrill to be a boss; it's much more natural and constructive than that.
"In our team we have a load of very clever engineers that come from a university background and spend a lot of time behind computers," Rowland says matter-of-factly.
"But I was racing from five years old, so I think I'm the most qualified guy to make those decisions. And, whilst I'm doing it right, it works. If I start doing it wrong and people can offer better advice, then I'll take it.
"But whilst it's like this, it stays like this."
His rivals will take that as a challenge, and well they might after a first quarter of the season that's featured a flurry of ominous Nissan success.
