{"id":132036,"date":"2025-09-09T20:21:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T20:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/132036\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T20:21:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T20:21:08","slug":"mclarens-puzzling-team-orders-plus-red-bulls-driver-led-monza-breakthrough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/132036\/","title":{"rendered":"McLaren\u2019s puzzling team orders. Plus: Red Bull\u2019s driver-led Monza breakthrough"},"content":{"rendered":"

Prime Tire Newsletter | This is The Athletic\u2019s twice-weekly F1<\/a> newsletter. Sign up here<\/a> to receive Prime Tire directly in your inbox on Tuesday and Friday.<\/p>\n

Welcome back to Prime Tire. If you read this before you opened\u00a0The Pulse<\/a>, please go back and mark this as unread. The Pulse was sent out first. McLaren says this is only fair.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m Patrick, and Madeline Coleman will be along shortly. Let\u2019s get to a rant.<\/p>\n

I Didn\u2019t Like ThatMcLaren\u2019s team orders are getting annoying<\/p>\n

McLaren\u2019s decision to order Oscar Piastri to hand second place back to Lando Norris at the Italian Grand Prix was silly. His decision to agree was sillier. I\u2019ve stewed on this for two days,\u00a0and Luke Smith\u2019s column<\/a>\u00a0this morning backs me up. So let\u2019s dig in.<\/p>\n

During the race, Norris suffered a slow pit stop due to a wheel-fitting issue that dropped him behind his teammate Piastri on track. McLaren then ordered Piastri to let Norris pass.<\/p>\n

Team principal Andrea Stella explained that the plan<\/a> was never to change positions because of pit sequencing. McLaren wanted a pass to happen through on-track racing. The swap back result preserved a relatively similar gap as we had after the Dutch GP:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

But pit stops are part of racing \u2014\u00a0Piastri acknowledged this on team radio. When a mechanic fails to fit a wheel properly, it\u2019s not a cosmic injustice requiring correction; it\u2019s motorsport. Mistakes happen, drivers capitalize.\u00a0What really rubs me the wrong way is the artificiality of the decision.<\/p>\n

Piastri says\u00a0he wouldn\u2019t regret<\/a>\u00a0acceding even if it costs him the title. I don\u2019t believe him. I know I would regret it. Surely, most drivers would.<\/p>\n

Trust other athletes\u2019 instincts, not mine. Max Verstappen\u2019s\u00a0laughing reaction<\/a>\u00a0revealed how F1\u2019s reigning champion viewed it. And NBA star Joel Embiid posted what I assume most non-F1 athletes were thinking:<\/p>\n

These papaya rules are something else lmao\u2026.. Oscar is a better man than me<\/p>\n

\u2014 Joel Embiid (@JoelEmbiid) September 7, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to understand! It goes against the natural competitive spirit that any athlete feels.<\/p>\n

McLaren has drawn the line at something affecting their drivers through no fault of their own. A team error that makes the positioning unfair. But when Piastri found himself ahead through racing circumstances, that advantage\u00a0was\u00a0fair. McLaren reaching for the reset button was what felt unfair. It sanitized the authenticity that makes racing compelling.<\/p>\n

McLaren\u2019s approach does make business sense. Happy drivers, team unity, sustained success. But the sport\u2019s greatest, most beloved champions weren\u2019t always team players, but ruthless competitors.\u00a0As Luke noted<\/a>, in one example, Sebastian Vettel famously ignored team orders to beat Mark Webber at the 2013 Malaysian Grand Prix, later saying, \u201cI was faster, I passed him, I won.\u201d<\/p>\n

That mentality helped deliver four consecutive championships. It made the fight worth watching.<\/p>\n

Racing thrives on tension and split-second moments that define races. In my view, the principled approach is to let whatever happens, happen.<\/p>\n

Hey! Listen!New philosophy pays off for Red Bull<\/p>\n

Verstappen\u00a0dominated at Monza this weekend<\/a>, winning by nearly 20 seconds in what felt like a throwback to his unstoppable 2023 form. After months of struggling with car balance issues that left him feeling like \u201ca passenger,\u201d Red Bull finally cracked the code by doing something radical: It listened to its driver instead of their simulators.<\/p>\n

As my colleague Madeline writes<\/a>, the team had been throwing extreme setup changes at the car all season, essentially admitting they didn\u2019t understand what was wrong. This time, it leaned more on Verstappen\u2019s feedback and less on data, bringing track-specific upgrades that actually worked.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was nice, for once,\u201d Verstappen said post-race, probably the most relaxed we\u2019ve seen him in months.<\/p>\n

The big question now is whether this was just a Monza fluke or if Red Bull has genuinely solved its car problems. Team boss Laurent Mekies thinks it\u2019s \u201cprobably Monza-specific,\u201d but hey \u2014 after watching McLaren win for months, we\u2019ll take any shakeup we can get. Head here for\u00a0more on Red Bull\u2019s mindset shift<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And now off to Madeline in the paddock!<\/p>\n

Why Yuki Tsunoda didn\u2019t keep up with Verstappen<\/p>\n

Yuki Tsunoda has been making progress in each race weekend, though it may not always be evident in the results. Take qualifying on Saturday, for instance. The Japanese driver said he was consistently behind Verstappen, only about two-tenths of a second off the Dutchman\u2019s pace, in the early qualifying stages. But in Q3, he led the pack, which typically is what you want to avoid at a track like Monza. Tows can be powerful gamechangers, and Tsunoda didn\u2019t have one.<\/p>\n

What happened Sunday to keep Tsunoda nowhere near Verstappen\u2019s level was no fault of his own. Midway through the race, Liam Lawson\u00a0tried to overtake<\/a>\u00a0Tsunoda around the outside, and his front left tire tagged the back right tire of the Red Bull car, causing damage to Tsunoda\u2019s car, the Red Bull driver said post-race. As Tsunoda pointed out, Lawson wasn\u2019t fighting for points when this battle occurred.<\/p>\n

Tsunoda was unable to work his way into the points after starting ninth and running a medium-hard strategy, because his pace was gone after picking up the damage from that battle. He finished the race in P13.<\/p>\n

Another detail flew a bit under the radar during the Italian GP weekend:\u00a0Tsunoda and Verstappen didn\u2019t have the same car specifications again. Earlier this season, they had different floor specifications, and Tsunoda didn\u2019t receive the same spec until Hungary, before the summer break. This past weekend, in Monza, they had different floor specifications, with Verstappen running the upgrade.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not like (the) difference I had before,\u201d Tsunoda said. \u201cThis upgrade, I would say, is not huge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mekies described it as \u201ca small update,\u201d and the hope is for both cars to be fitted with the upgrade for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

Vroom, vroomF1\u2019s fastest weekend ever<\/p>\n

It\u2019s no surprise that when you come to a track dubbed F1\u2019s \u201cTemple of Speed,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0you get fast races. We just happened to get three versions of it this last weekend, and I thought it was neat.<\/p>\n

A new fastest lap:\u00a0Verstappen delivered a stormer of a lap time to qualify on pole: 1:18.792 seconds at an average speed of 164.47 miles per hour.\u00a0Luke broke down that lap here<\/a>. True magic.<\/p>\n

A new fastest average race speed:\u00a0250.706 kilometers per hour\u00a0(155.781 mph), again set by the race winner Verstappen. That shattered Michael Schumacher\u2019s 22-year record at Monza of 247.585 kilometers per hour (153.842 mph).<\/p>\n

A new fastest race time:\u00a01 hour, 13 minutes, 24.325 seconds. The shortest time to complete a full Grand Prix without red flags.<\/p>\n

Outside the Points<\/p>\n

\ud83d\ude31 Ollie Bearman, like\u00a0his Haas predecessor<\/a>, is on the\u00a0verge of a race ban<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcdd The Dutch GP stewards\u00a0will meet<\/a> on Friday to decide on Williams\u2019 right of review over Carlos Sainz\u2019s 10-second Zandvoort penalty.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfa2 And, finally, Luke delved into why Lewis Hamilton\u2019s first weekend at Monza with Ferrari\u00a0was a \u201croller coaster.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83d\udceb Love Prime Tire? Check out The Athletic\u2019s other newsletters<\/a>.<\/p>\n

(Top photo: Joe Portlock\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n