McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri are locked in a fight for the F1 2025 world championship with the team steadfastly refusing to favour either one of them as Max Verstappen poses a rising threat.

But have you ever stopped to consider what the value of winning the drivers’ title is to a Formula 1 team? Put aside the champagne and the personal joy and satisfaction; what is it actually worth? What does it mean? The answer will probably surprise you.

Does McLaren really care who wins the world championship?

Norris and Piastri are locked in battle for this year’s title, split by just a single point with four races (and two sprints) remaining.

McLaren’s dynamic duo enjoyed a dominant position at the start of the year, helping their employer claim a second successive constructors’ championship.

But as Norris flashed across the line to finish third in Singapore, sealing McLaren the crown, it was already abundantly clear that the team’s early-season advantage had evaporated.

George Russell won the race for Mercedes and Verstappen in second was emerging as an ever more serious threat in the drivers’ title chase.

And as the Flying Dutchman moves inexorably closer to the top of the points standings, McLaren insists on treating its drivers fairly, without prejudice, preference or priority.

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

Norris and Piastri would stand a better chance of the title if the team focused its efforts on one of them; by allowing them to compete, they’re potentially stealing points off one another.

From a team’s perspective, that doesn’t overly matter – a one-two finish counts the same no matter which order they cross the line.

But why, with a world championship title on the line, hasn’t McLaren made the tough call?

Is it a lack of assertiveness from Andrea Stella and Zak Brown, a contractual constraint or something else?

It’s fair to suggest that Brown and co are prepared and capable of making the tough decision.

When Daniel Ricciardo wasn’t working out, the team was not shy in pulling the plug. It was a bold, brave move, a clear decision that in many respects ended Ricciardo’s career.

We can therefore reasonably suggest that there’s no absence of ‘sisu’ – to borrow a phrase from Mika Hakkinen – within McLaren’s senior leadership.

It’s possible there is a contractual requirement for equality, though on that we can only speculate given that those details have not been forthcoming.

Evidence does suggest there is such a clause, given the efforts the team has made in its quest for equality, but there have also been moments that point against that, too.

Reversing the order on track in the latter stages of the Italian Grand Prix immediately springs to mind.

So while possible that there’s a contractual obligation for equality, it seems unlikely to extend to specific on track decisions, if it exists at all.

So while we can’t entirely dismiss that as a possibility, I personally need more convincing.

Another point against such a notion is the at least perceived bias towards Norris, but again that’s not something I – as an Australian – can take seriously.

It’s a concept that undermines the team’s efforts all season.

Of course, it’s possible to cherry pick examples where Norris has been favoured and Piastri compromised to help the Brit.

Because hey, McLaren is British and there is a perception of a nationalistic bias within the sport (hello, Sky Sports).

And while yes, McLaren as an organisation is British, its CEO is American and team principal Italian.

The supporting technical team consists of staff who’ve won world championships with other teams and with non-British drivers.

There is no clear reason why McLaren would favour Norris based purely on nationality.

Of course, he was a junior with the team and chose to stick it out with McLaren despite potentially race-winning opportunities arising for him elsewhere.

He’s McLaren through and through and the team has invested heavily in him. Logically then, since he’s a product of McLaren’s own development programme, there’s a predisposition to him, right?

Only that argument fails to take into account the leap of faith the team took in hiring Piastri.

When Ricciardo was struggling in 2022, and with a year left on his contract, Brown made a monumental call.

By axing Ricciardo not only was he jettisoning the team’s most recent race winner (to that point), but paid a significant sum to do so.

It was suggested to me that the figure was in the $20million bracket, a sum that hasn’t been refuted when put to the team.

Put it another way: McLaren paid $20million to bring in Piastri for 2023.

Even to a Formula 1 team, that is a huge chunk of change, far more than the squad would have invested in Norris ahead of his arrival in F1.

Surely, the Australian wasn’t brought in to be a second fiddle, to support Norris? At that figure, he was hired to do one thing: deliver race wins and world championships.

But there’s one other point worth considering, and bear with me because it’s controversial.

Does McLaren actually want to win the drivers’ title? Does it actually care?

To bring things back full circle, what does McLaren actually gain should Norris or Piastri emerge victorious at the end of the season?

In Formula 1, the constructors’ championship is a far less glamorous competition but a far more significant one because it’s that which determines a team’s prize money entitlements.

All of F1’s riches are attached to the teams’ standings, not the drivers’ crown.

The cold, hard facts of the matter are that the drivers’ championship comes with a cost associated with it – potentially a significant one.

While, yes, there are bonuses that are paid out if a team wins the constructors’, that is offset by the revenue that comes as a result of that accomplishment.

There are likely escalators and other bonuses built into sponsorship deals too which reward the team for its full year result.

But for the drivers, should they win the title, it is likely there is no additional income (a team directly linking its financials to the fate of an individual driver is a dangerous game).

Sure, there’s some television time and notoriety that will no doubt please the sponsors, but there is no $100million windfall for the team as reward for having the world champion among its ranks.

Indeed, winning the title likely comes with a healthy performance bonus for the driver, costing the team money.

We can glean some idea of the figures here courtesy of Felipe Massa’s current court proceedings, in which he’s seeking $82million in damages arguing lost bonuses, commercial opportunities, among others.

Within documents he’s filed it was claimed there as a $3.5million bonus available had he won the title. Adjusted to today’s money, that’s in region of $5.3million.

There’s also the non-tangibles such as negotiating power moving forward – a world champion can command a higher base salary.

A world championship win is like the old saying: a dog is for life, not just Christmas.

So boiling it down to a simple matter of economics, there is no motivation from the teams to win the drivers’ title like there is the constructors’ – one could even argue they’re disincentivised, though that’s probably an overstatement.

And if you struggle to buy that concept, look at Williams.

It has won seven drivers’ titles in its history, never with the same driver twice, and has only retained the world champion on three of those occasions.

Nelson Piquet, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost and Damon Hill were all treated like light bulbs, removed and replaced after their title-winning campaign with the Grove squad.

Of course, no team in its right mind would reject the chance to win the title, but it does explain why McLaren is willing to take greater risk with the drivers’ quest than with the constructors’ – it stands to lose comparatively little in the grand scheme of things.

So, what is the value of a world champion driver within a world champion team? And is it worth disrupting the harmony that exists within the organisation to pursue it?

More on McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri from PlanetF1.com

👉 Lando Norris news

👉 Oscar Piastri news

For McLaren, it looks to be a source of conflict, a way of undermining the culture it has worked so hard to create.

It has produced a championship-winning car, two years in a row, it has achieved what it set out to do. Does it need the drivers’ championship, too?

Perhaps the wisest play in that context really is to allow its drivers to battle it out; work to support them both and may the best man win.

By favouring one, the team is pushing away the other. By attempting to be impartial it is working to protect what it has worked so hard to build, and set itself up for more success in future.

Of course, there is a value in winning the drivers’ championship and, given the choice, any team would jump at the opportunity to have one of its drivers raise the trophy.

It’s the pinnacle of achievement in world motorsport and those who achieve it are sublimely talented and absolutely worthy.

But to a team, when you really boil it down, it’s far less relevant and important than you might think.

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