To borrow a phrase from a well-known football manager, this is F1 racing heritage.<\/p>\n
Norris was expected to lash out at Piastri and blame him for nearly throwing away valuable points that secured their lead over rivals in the Constructors\u2019 Championship. <\/p>\n
Instead, he took the blame for the accident and moved on swiftly by taking victory at the following race in Austria. It\u2019s unusual for an athlete to admit to making a mistake, especially as they opt for the \u2018me versus the narrative\u2019 strategy that stokes tension in their team. <\/p>\n
Norris reacted with resilience after Canada<\/a>, showcasing how far his mental strength had come since admitting in his rookie year that he felt \u201cdepressed\u201d and had self-doubts [via Sky Sports<\/a>]. <\/p>\n It avoided the unwanted attention and speculation that could\u2019ve derailed McLaren\u2019s coming-of-age year, and perhaps gave some insight into why this title rivalry is unlike any that has ever happened in F1. <\/p>\n McLaren\u2019s dominance this season is not like Red Bull\u2019s in 2023; they are still going into races unsure that they can pull it off simply because of how close the field has become. Charles Leclerc\u2019s unexpected pole in Hungary and Max Verstappen\u2019s tendency to show up when it matters on race weekends mean McLaren are being kept on their toes, and it requires a full team effort. <\/p>\n There have been so many instances beyond the collision in Canada where things could\u2019ve turned sour between Norris and Piastri the same way they did with Hamilton and Rosberg. The team was unwilling to swap cars in Silverstone after a penalty for Piastri that they didn\u2019t agree with<\/a>, or going down a car design route that initially impacted Norris\u2019 driving style<\/a>. <\/p>\n Either of those would\u2019ve been enough to make things nuclear at the height of the Mercedes title race between 2014 and 2016, but McLaren team principal Andrea Stella thinks they have only strengthened their relationship. <\/p>\n \u201cThe relationship between Oscar and Lando keeps improving. This is not the effect of a random evolution. This is because we invest in relationships. When I refer to the fundamentals of F1, relationships are probably slightly less tangible, but I think they are as fundamental as aerodynamics,\u201d said Stella. <\/p>\n \u201cThis involves the relationship between drivers and the team and between the drivers themselves. If I take the race we had last year in Hungary, we spent quite a lot of time reviewing that individually with the drivers and together. We tried to learn from each other as much as possible. We reminded ourselves that F1 is difficult, and we are always going to face some difficulties. This is an awareness we need to have.\u201d<\/p>\n Andrea Stella is not wrong, McLaren is \u2018lucky\u2019 to have Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri<\/p>\n Norris has been devoted to the McLaren cause since he signed to their driver academy, forging a close relationship with CEO Zak Brown in the process. <\/p>\n When they failed to initially capitalise on the new regulation cycle in 2022, the Briton could\u2019ve easily been in the running for a seat at Red Bull alongside Max Verstappen after praise from Helmut Marko. Instead, he stuck with the McLaren project, and now he\u2019s reaping the rewards. <\/p>\n Having worked with Fernando Alonso and Michael Schumacher when they demanded teams work towards their interests, Stella knows that this doesn\u2019t come around often in F1. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m a lucky team principal because the two drivers are very reasonable, very fair, very correct, humble, and above all, they understand that we are here not only to pursue our interest in the present but also to protect the future of their own careers and of McLaren Racing,\u201d said Stella. <\/p>\n We all want our drivers to be ruthless on track, but McLaren\u2019s management of the Norris and Piastri battle is a tribute to a key word in their team name: Racing. That\u2019s what we\u2019re all here for, and we\u2019re lucky to be watching two drivers who are willing to sacrifice their own interests in a bid to make things a fair and entertaining sporting contest. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Lando Norris collided with Oscar Piastri in the closing stages of the Canadian Grand Prix, it felt…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,1737,823,913,806,805,803,804,849,2333,85],"class_list":["post-47304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-lando-norris","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-mclaren","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-nico-rosberg","tag-oscar-piastri","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47304","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=47304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Lando](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GettyImages-2220295949-1024x703.jpg\")
Photo by Mark Sutton \u2013 Formula 1\/Formula 1 via Getty ImagesWhy Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris title fight hasn\u2019t turned sour <\/p>\n