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Until recently, the idea of Lando Norris fighting for a Formula One championship seemed fanciful.
As McLaren enjoyed a huge upswing in performance and Red Bull began to fade, narrowing the points gap to Max Verstappen in the drivers’ standings, Norris kept claiming he wasn’t giving it any thought.
“I’m still 70 points behind Max,” Norris said after crushing the field by 22 seconds at Zandvoort. “So it’s pretty stupid to think of anything at the minute.” He added it was “not a question that I need to get asked every single weekend.”
Of course, the questions kept coming. No matter how admirable the ‘one race at a time’ approach may be, if Norris and McLaren were serious about a run for the title, even if a long shot, then they had to start planning for every eventuality.
Particularly its use of team orders.
Monza was the wake-up call. It wasn’t so much the result, where the 1-2 slipped through its fingers thanks to Ferrari’s ambitious one-stop strategy that snared victory for Charles Leclerc. It was the opening lap fight between Norris and Oscar Piastri that, while fair and within its internal racing rules, cost Norris two positions.
LAP 1 / 53
PIASTRI TAKES THE LEAD!! 😱
The Australian sweeps around Norris at the della Roggia chicane to lead the field!! 👏
Leclerc also squeezes past into second, sparking jubilation in the stands! #F1 #ItalianGP pic.twitter.com/ViptiU4v5v
— Formula 1 (@F1) September 1, 2024
He still took another chunk out of Verstappen’s championship lead, making the 62-point gap with eight races and three sprints to go a little less daunting. Andrea Stella, McLaren’s team principal, acknowledged post-race that it was time to seriously consider firmer team orders and whether McLaren’s full weight needed to go behind Norris in the championship fight.
The post-Monza discussions led to that plan getting the green light. Stella told the BBC that McLaren would “bias our support to Lando, but we want to do it without too much compromise on our principles.” Importantly, according to Stella, there was also buy-in from Piastri, to the extent he would give up a win if it would help Norris.
Those principles would always make this an uncomfortable situation for a team that takes such pride in its racing culture, highlighted by Norris’s decision to give up the win to Piastri in Hungary. It would never be as straightforward as Ferrari’s tactics with Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello, or Mercedes with Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas, where calls were quick and ruthless.
But this was a decision the team had to take. Yes, 62 points is a big margin for Norris to recover. One DNF for Norris and a bounce-back victory by Verstappen would completely change the picture. So long as there’s a chance, McLaren really has to give its all to try and make it happen and, importantly, have a plan in place.
Norris has a teammate in Piastri who pushes him all the way for pace while understanding the situation and has the perfect temperament for such a scenario. We saw it in Hungary when Piastri kept his cool while waiting to get the lead back. There were no hysterics over the radio or doubts about his teammate. He was always confident Norris would do the right thing. Now, if required, he’ll repay the favor.
“The team has asked me to help out,” Piastri explained Thursday in Azerbaijan. “I’ve said for the last few races that if I was asked, then I would.
“Of course, naturally, as a driver, it’s never an easy thing or a simple thing to agree to. But again, there’s a much bigger picture in play than just myself.”
Norris insisted that it was “not as simple” as Piastri moving aside to hand him a win, nor is it a situation he anticipates.
“It depends what the positions are for, what positions we’re fighting for,” Norris said. “There’s many different scenarios. People on the outside think it’s an easy, simple thing. It’s not. But we’ve come up with a good plan of how we can approach it all.”
Norris acknowledged Piastri is “fighting for his own championship, his own career, and that’s a very valid reason for him to want to fight and do well.” As margins between teammates go on the F1 grid, it’s hard to find many, if any, tighter than between Norris and Piastri.
It means even with this added support, Norris’s approach toward the championship should not and will not change. He needs to do the best job he can each weekend. In an ideal world, Norris won’t need Piastri’s help because he’ll already be ahead of him. Piastri’s task will then be to take points off Verstappen.
It’s up to Norris to make that happen. Regularly his own worst critic, he has freely admitted to not performing at the level required to fight for a championship at points this year. The fact Norris is still in the hunt, even if it seems like a long shot, means there is time to rectify that, especially as Red Bull continues to struggle to turn its form around.
This new McLaren policy is merely a safety net that can be enforced if necessary. It will stay fluid and be reviewed race by race as the championship picture grows clearer the nearer we get to Abu Dhabi. If Norris can seize this championship moment with both hands, it may never need full implementation.
Reflecting on how the closing stages in Hungary unfolded, Stella said you should “never find yourself preparing the flight plan as you fly.” Now, McLaren and Norris have a flight plan.
Sixty-two points, eight races to go. It’s game on.
Top photo: SIPA USA
