MEXICO CITY — Lando Norris believes Formula One title rival Max Verstappen will “sacrifice himself” to beat him after calling his penalized moves in Mexico “over the limit.”
Verstappen was hit with time penalties for two incidents with Norris on Lap 10 of the Mexico City Grand Prix. He firstly pushed Norris off the track at Turn 4 when trying to defend second place and then deliberately ran wide a few corners later to stay ahead of the McLaren.
Norris called the moves “dangerous” over his team radio before the stewards investigated Verstappen’s actions, eventually handing him a 10-second time penalty for each incident.
After serving the penalty in the pits, Verstappen eventually finished the race in sixth place. Norris finished second to cut Verstappen’s lead to 47 points at the top of the drivers’ championship.
The incident came one week after Norris was hit with a controversial time penalty for overtaking Verstappen off-track in the United States Grand Prix, where he felt Verstappen had forced him wide while defending.
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“I go into a race expecting a tough battle with Max,” Norris said. “It’s clear that it doesn’t matter if he wins or is second — his only job is to beat me in the race. And he’ll sacrifice himself to do that like he did today.
“But I want to have good battles with him. I want to have those tough battles like I’ve seen him have plenty of times, but fair ones. It’s always going to be on the line, it’s always going to be tough with Max. He’s never going to make anyone’s life easy, especially mine, at this point of the year.
“I think today it was just not fair, clean racing. Therefore, I think he got what he had coming to him.”
It was the third time this season that Norris and Verstappen, friends outside of F1, have been involved in a controversial incident stemming from one of their on-track battles.
At the Austrian Grand Prix in June, they collided while battling for the lead in the closing stages, resulting in a time penalty for Verstappen while Norris retired. At the U.S. GP, there was no contact, but the battle prompted a discussion among drivers to review F1’s racing rules.
Norris said that what happened in Mexico was “another level” to both those incidents as he was already ahead of Verstappen in both cases.
“I am avoiding crashing today. This is the difference,” Norris said.
“I can’t speak for him, and maybe he’ll say something different. I think today was a step too far from both of those. It was clear the stewards agreed with that. I don’t see it as a win or anything like this. But it’s more that I hope Max acknowledges that he took it a step too far.”
After the race, Verstappen brushed off the penalty, saying: “Honestly, 20 seconds is a lot, but I’m not going to cry about it, and I’m not gong to share my opinion.”
McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown welcomed Verstappen’s penalties, saying on Sky Sports after the race that his moves were “getting a bit ridiculous.”
“I applaud the FIA stewards,” Brown said. “Enough is enough. Let’s just have some good, clean racing moving forwards. I think the stewards are on it. I think that’s clear by the penalties that were given. The stewards did a good job this weekend.
Top photo: Kym Illman/Getty Images, Mark Thompson/Getty Images
