SILVERSTONE, England (AP) \u2014 Lando Norris says reports that Max Verstappen has considered a move to McLaren are \u201ca cool thing\u201d to hear but \u201cnot a serious thing\u201d as speculation swirls in Formula 1 about a switch which could create a lineup of two champions. <\/p>\n
Reports from media including Sky Sports indicated last week that Verstappen\u2019s management had requested, and held, a meeting with McLaren ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix. The content of any discussions wasn\u2019t reported and the Dutch driver has yet to comment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a cool thing, it\u2019s a good thing that a four-time world champion wants to come on board and wants to potentially join the team,\u201d Norris said Thursday as he prepares for his home British Grand Prix.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know how much of it\u2019s true, but it\u2019s a cool thing and if there\u2019s an opportunity for me to drive with other people, it\u2019s something I\u2019ve always looked forward to. But it\u2019s not a thing for now. It\u2019s not a serious thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
McLaren chief executive Zak Brown said on the Up To Speed podcast released Wednesday that Norris and teammate Oscar Piastri are \u201cnot going anywhere\u201d and he\u2019d only consider Verstappen if McLaren had an opening.<\/p>\n
Besides Verstappen, \u201cquite a few others\u201d in F1 are interested in a potential McLaren drive too, Norris said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m also just excited for my future with McLaren. I\u2019m still going to be here for many, many more years, so I\u2019m excited for whoever I get partnered with,\u201d he added. \u201cBut for the time being, me and Oscar are still working very well together. We\u2019re excited to work together for more years too, so that\u2019s our focus for now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Verstappen remains under contract with Red Bull until the end of 2028 but there have been signs the deal includes options to exit earlier under certain conditions. A planned move to McLaren for his long-time race engineer GianPiero Lambiase increased the speculation of a potential move to McLaren for the Dutchman.<\/p>\n
Mercedes has been interested in Verstappen in the past but team principal Toto Wolff has said he wants to keep title rivals George Russell and Kimi Antonelli. <\/p>\n
Verstappen\u2019s also previously suggested he\u2019d consider leaving F1.<\/p>\n
Norris said he believed he could hold his own if Verstappen, a friend and on-track rival for the title last year, is ever his teammate.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do believe I can beat any driver. I think what makes Max so incredible is how he is over the course of a season, every single weekend, performing to the level that he does is what\u2019s impressive,\u201d Norris said. <\/p>\n
\u201cI believe whether it\u2019s him or having a chance to go against Lewis (Hamilton) or Fernando (Alonso), any of the drivers that people know are some of the best, I think it\u2019s a cool opportunity for me at the same time. So, excited for whatever may come my way in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP auto racing: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/auto-racing<\/p>\n
The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SILVERSTONE, England (AP) \u2014 Lando Norris says reports that Max Verstappen has considered a move to McLaren are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":775762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-775761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=775761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/775762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=775761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=775761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=775761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}