On the face of it, McLaren’s double disqualification from the Las Vegas Grand Prix had the potential to be a serious blow to the title hopes of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.
But with Norris holding a 24-point lead, and Piastri tied with Max Verstappen, has the team’s task in the F1 2025 title race just become more straightforward?
McLaren driver Lando Norris can win F1 2025 title at Qatar Grand Prix
A version of this article originally appeared in PlanetF1.com’s conclusions from the 2025 Las Vegas Grand Prix
The one comfort for McLaren, at least, is that the blow of its double Las Vegas Grand Prix disqualification should be easily cushioned.
Even with both cars excluded last weekend, Lando Norris still retains a very healthy 24-point lead in the championship with two races to go.
And one of those races is this weekend in Qatar, a McLaren circuit if ever there was one, where the car’s season-long advantage in medium-speed corners promises to be more potent than ever.
And if Qatar doesn’t quite go to plan, there is always Abu Dhabi, where Norris dominated from pole position to bring home last year’s constructors’ title.
So there is no need to panic. Not just yet. Not right now.
No need to question whether it was tempting fate by printing all those ‘Lando Norris: 2025 world champion’ t-shirts probably en route to Lusail right now.
The title race has not just been blown wide open as some have breathlessly claimed.
Lando Norris vs Oscar Piastri: McLaren head-to-head scores for F1 2025
👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates
👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates
The great luxury of Norris and McLaren’s dominance over recent weeks is that they can afford to suffer one – but only one – disaster and still get away with it.
This is the advantage team and driver bought themselves in Mexico and Brazil.
If there is a temptation to change anything at all at this stage, it might be to call off Oscar Piastri’s title hopes once and for all now Verstappen is level on points with him and throw the entire team’s support behind Norris for the last two rounds – just to be sure.
Yet the respective form of both drivers – Piastri somehow remains without a podium finish since his last victory at Zandvoort nearly three months ago – means that situation is taking care of itself naturally anyway.
It was only after qualifying that Andrea Stella, the McLaren team principal, was reflecting on the “important investment” the team had made to solve its performance issues in Las Vegas.
McLaren, he said, had worked hard to understand the requirements of this circuit, both from a technical and driving perspective, having struggled in the first two editions of this event in 2023/24.
Clearly something – potentially related to the lack of representative running in practice – went wrong, Stella pointing to unexpected levels of porpoising and an increase in the movement of the floor after both cars sustained accidental damage.
More on McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri from PlanetF1.com
It is nothing short of catastrophic – not to mention highly embarrassing – when any team, let alone one of McLaren’s stature, sees both cars thrown out of a race.
And as a result, the pressure and scrutiny on the team heading to Qatar is far higher than it should be.
In Stella, though, McLaren has one of the calmest and studious minds in the pit lane to guide the team through it.
His steady hand will never be more important than over the next few days.
This will only become a season-defining blow if McLaren allows it to be.
Reader reaction: Can McLaren see of the threat of Max Verstappen?
VictorBravo: The failure of McLaren to identify a No1 driver was identified as a risk early this season. Now we see the results.
Corstiaan: Max only realistic hope is that Oscar drastically improves on his current form and BELIEVES he still has a chance to become WDC and understands that Norris needs to be defeated one way or the other. But i don’t have high hopes for that to happen.
DerJoul: I am curious if the chosen one at McLaren will keep his head straight at the next race, something in me is saying, that Lando will break and need a new pair of underwear
Fire Storm: While the DSQ of McLaren was a massive blow, it wasn’t the end of the world, at least not for Norris.
Despite him coming out with zero points from Vegas, Norris has lost just 2 points to Verstappen in the last 3 GPs.
In the meantime, Piastri’s challenge has collapsed. 24 points with 2 races to go (and a sprint) is still good. All he has to do is stay out of trouble in the remaining races.
Jojo (in reply to Fire Storm): Without the DSQ, Norris would have had one hand on the trophy, with a 30 point lead over his team mate, he would likely have wrapped up the championship in Qatar, as long as he didn’t drop more than 5 points to Piastri or 17 to Verstappen.
He’s still the most likely to win the championship, but now it just takes a DNF or a big mistake and it could prove costly. As you say, he just needs to stay out of trouble but I’m sure he will be more nervous about it.
Steven West: McLaren can’t throw their weight behind Norris, unless they want to go back on Brown’s public commitment to let them race.
So, as I see it, Norris has to contend with Max on his own and may have to contend with Piastri if he finds his mojo again.
Bleak as it looks for Piastri, he’s still got a chance and they committed publicly to honor that.
So, what if Piastri sticks it on pole for Qatar? “Oscar, let Lando through, please”… um, nope… And why should he?
Sure the title fight still favors Norris, but McLaren have planted a bunch of landmines that could go off in the next two race weekends…
Your comment is under moderation M: Two things from me.
Firstly, since the Red Bull seats will be a hot topic in the coming week(s) how about a shout out to Ayumu Iwasa for winning the Super Formula championship this weekend.
Secondly, if the title is decided in Abu Dhabi, 2025 will be remembered as one of the great seasons.
That said, I’ve reflected on the state of modern F1 and although I don’t like it’s continuation towards “sporting entertainment”, I think 2024 was one of the best years this sport has ever seen.
There was endless change off track, but most importantly there were so many brilliant races, several of which went down to the wire. Canada, Austria, Britain, Baku, Mexico, COTA, Belgium… just exhilarating grands prix.
Even if 2025 has a massive sting in the tail, most of the races have been fairly dull.
I think people just remember the title battle but to me 2024 was a classic. Even the F2 season was classic, even if the title race petered off towards the end.
Iggy970: If there ever was time for McLaren to introduce “1st driver-2nd driver” setup it would be now!
This DSQ is major blow for Norris, Piastri title ambitions with Max getting so close and if nothing is done the situation from 1986 championship will repeat.
Just as a reminder, Prost won the championship in a inferior McLaren car, while Mansell and Piquet were fighting against each other in much better Williams car.
Time for Stella to go to Piastri and tell him “you had your chance, you blow it, we have been fair to you so far but now after the Las Vegas blow the team wants the drivers title, so you need to do everything in your power to support Lando”
Arthur: Looks like McLaren pushed the envelope and fell foul got punished. Next!
Eleanor Rigby: Blando will probably win the championship – Max would need to win both races and the Sprint, and Lando could come 2nd in all of them and still win.
The only hope Max has is a Lando DNF, or perhaps McLaren’s performance falls massively off with this new plank-wear clampdown.
Still – I dont think his stock will actually rise that much if he does – in fact the dialog will probably be about how much heavy weather he made of the WDC in a dominant car.
Max, on the other hand, will probably lose the WDC – but his stock’s risen even further after this season.