Oscar Piastri, Lando Norris and Max Verstappen shut down talk of McLaren team orders to prioritise Norris for drivers’ championship
“So yeah, if you’re a true winner and racer as a driver, then even if you’re behind, you keep going. Otherwise, what’s the point of coming? Otherwise, you can easily label yourself as the number 2 driver, which I don’t think he wants to be either…”
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella had stated earlier in the day that she had no intention of opting for Norris, aware that there was a group on social media accusing the team of exactly that.
Max Verstappen is in Qatar.Credit: Getty Images
“No, there’s no reason [favour Norris]“We have always said that we will leave it to the two drivers to fight for the last chance of victory, and that will be the case in Qatar, unless the mathematics says otherwise,” the Italian driver said in a Q&A published by the team on Thursday.
“Let’s not forget that if someone had told us at the beginning of the season that we would be in this situation with two races left, we would have signed. Now we will fight for the double world championship, confident in ourselves and aware of our strength.”
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Norris said he would not expect Piastri to help him and would not ask him to help him. He has beaten his teammate in every race since Zandvoort and although this was his first ‘match point’, he said he would treat this weekend no differently than in Las Vegas; this was his first time finishing the championship race.
“No,” said Norris. “Previous space [Vegas] It was 24 points, still 24. Nothing needs to change. We were still fast last weekend and would have been faster if it weren’t for the problems. We know Red Bull have been fast lately and we expect them to be fast here and next weekend as well. Nobody needs to change anything. “We treated Max and Red Bull as a great team and rivals all season long.”
Norris was philosophical about his disqualification last weekend for backplate wear (parts of which were just 0.07mm over the limit).
“Those are the rules,” he shrugged. “It was painful, of course, because so much effort was put into one weekend and it ended up disappearing very quickly. Everyone at McLaren is disappointed and we were disappointed too. But I found it easy to move on.”
McLaren apologized to its drivers after the race, and explained in a Stella Q&A that “unexpected extensive dolphin formation” at the street circuit in Las Vegas was the main problem.
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