{"id":252683,"date":"2025-10-31T07:17:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T07:17:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/252683\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T07:17:13","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T07:17:13","slug":"what-the-chatter-in-the-paddock-is-now-saying-about-mclarens-stance-on-lando-norris-and-oscar-piastri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/252683\/","title":{"rendered":"What the \u2018chatter in the paddock\u2019 is now saying about McLaren\u2019s stance on Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\/ Follow us on Google Discover <\/a> <\/p>\n

McLaren have been in the most privileged position in the paddock this season, but that\u2019s come with its own problems.<\/p>\n

The constructors\u2019 championship<\/a> was wrapped up by McLaren<\/a> with six races to go, a Formula 1 record they now share with Red Bull.<\/p>\n

McLaren staff joined Lando Norris<\/a> on the podium that day at the Singapore Grand Prix, while his teammate Oscar Piastri<\/a> fielded some very uncomfortable questions.<\/p>\n

Position Drivers’ Championship PointsPts 1 357 2 356 3 321 4 258 5 210 6 146 7 97 8 73 9 41 10 39 <\/p>\n

The Australian was still leading the drivers\u2019 championship, but his advantage had just been reduced by Norris after a clumsy move on the first lap.<\/p>\n

This led to Norris facing repercussions at the following race<\/a>, suggesting that McLaren had laid some blame at the 25-year-old\u2019s feet, even if this wasn\u2019t going to return the points that Piastri lost out on.<\/p>\n

The pair collided again in Austin, and while this was going on, Max Verstappen was rapidly turning what looked like a two-horse race for the drivers\u2019 championship into a three-man contest.<\/p>\n

Norris had a debrief with McLaren after Singapore<\/a>, telling the team exactly what he needed to start winning races again.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s worked, and despite all of the effort Piastri is putting in behind the scenes<\/a>, the talk in the paddock is that it might not be enough.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: McLaren driver Lando Norris\u2019 life outside F1 from parents to celebration<\/a><\/p>\n

\"McLarenPhoto by Clive Mason\/Getty ImagesThe \u2018chatter in the paddock\u2019 in Formula 1 is McLaren are favouring Lando Norris over Oscar Piastri<\/p>\n

Speaking on the Inside the Piranha Club Podcast, journalists Ben Hunt and Rebecca Clancy were discussing the inner workings at McLaren.<\/p>\n

Hunt said: \u201cIt\u2019s a case now where you have to trust the data and what the engineers are telling you rather than what you think is going to happen and how you feel the situation is going to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s shades of Jenson Button, 2009, when he started so well and then all of a sudden the progress stopped with that car and other people caught up, and then it was just sort of limping over the line.<\/p>\n

Grand Prix starts306Pole positions8Podiums50Wins15Fastest laps8Points1235Championships1 (2009)Jenson Button\u2019s Formula 1 career<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I think that, unfortunately for Piastri at the moment, we\u2019ve got to the point where he\u2019s already been passed now, and he really does need to turn this corner very quickly and rediscover that form.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, it is all about form and trust, and he\u2019s got to refind that form and refind that trust in the team that they\u2019re telling the right things.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there\u2019s a suspicion or an inkling of doubt that, say for example, he fears that they might be favouring Norris over him in terms of strategy, that all feeds into the psychology of a driver.<\/p>\n

Clancy then suggested: \u201cWell, that\u2019s certainly the chatter in the paddock, isn\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n

Hunt concluded: \u201cAbsolutely. He just needs to clear all that out, go back to doing what he was doing, and trust what he\u2019s being told.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: McLaren driver Oscar Piastri\u2019s life outside F1 from height to girlfriend<\/a><\/p>\n

Zak Brown claims McLaren preference for Lando Norris over Oscar Piastri is \u2018nonsense\u2019<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to see why Piastri and his fans might be upset by how the second half of the season has played out.<\/p>\n

Decisions made on the pit wall that benefited Norris in Hungary, where he was put on a quicker strategy, at Monza when the drivers had to swap positions after a slow pit stop, and in Singapore with the aforementioned first corner incident.<\/p>\n

However, speaking to BBC Sport<\/a>, CEO Zak Brown suggested that any suggestion that McLaren were favouring Norris was \u2018nonsense\u2019.<\/p>\n

He went on to say regarding the incident at the Italian Grand Prix: \u201cIf the lead car is prepared to sacrifice their rights to the first call to help his teammate, who\u2019s actually his number one competitor in the championship, that\u2019s great teamwork.<\/p>\n

CategoryLando NorrisOscar Piastri2025 points357356Grand Prix results128Grand Prix qualifying1010Grand Prix wins67Grand Prix poles65Grand Prix podiums1614Best finish1st1stRetirements21Fastest laps65Grand Prix points finishes1819Sprint results12Sprint Qualifying13Sprint wins10Sprint poles01Sprint podiums23Sprint retirements11The 2025 F1 teammate head-to-head battle of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we did that to protect Oscar, which actually is to the detriment of Lando in an out-and-out race. Then we had the pit-stop issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone thinks we reversed the order because of the pit stop. That actually had nothing to do with it. So the challenge then becomes you almost can\u2019t explain everything all the time, and people jump to conclusions.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I understand what it looks like from the outside, but it\u2019s not what\u2019s going on on the inside, and we\u2019re trying so hard to give them equal opportunity and let them race hard.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish everyone recognised more of that. But I\u2019ve definitely come to the conclusion there are too many fans with too many views, (and) that we\u2019ve just got to be comfortable with how we\u2019re going racing inside McLaren, and that\u2019s what\u2019s most important to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brown might be doing his best to explain the situation, but many within the sport don\u2019t appear to be buying what he\u2019s saying.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Follow us on Google Discover McLaren have been in the most privileged position in the paddock this season,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252684,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,1737,913,2333,85],"class_list":["post-252683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-lando-norris","tag-mclaren","tag-oscar-piastri","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252683\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}