{"id":62116,"date":"2025-10-06T14:23:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-06T14:23:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/62116\/"},"modified":"2025-10-06T14:23:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T14:23:10","slug":"piastri-rages-over-unfair-norris-to-mar-mclaren-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/62116\/","title":{"rendered":"Piastri rages over &#8216;unfair&#8217; Norris to mar McLaren title"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>McLaren have been crowned F1 constructors&#8217; champions at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.1news.co.nz\/2025\/10\/06\/f1-george-russell-wins-singapore-gp-liam-lawson-finshes-15th\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Singapore Grand Prix<\/a> on a day when team harmony flew out the window with a raging Oscar Piastri accusing Lando Norris of &#8220;unfair&#8221; driving.<\/p>\n<p>As Mercedes&#8217; George Russell took victory from pole with Red Bull&#8217;s Max Verstappen runner-up, Norris ended up third, one place ahead of his Australian teammate after colliding with championship leader Piastri while overtaking on a dramatic opening lap.<\/p>\n<p>Norris&#8217;s podium ensured the British team sealed back-to-back triumphs in the constructors&#8217; championship, but the normally calm and controlled Piastri, who&#8217;d started third on the grid two places ahead of Norris, sounded rattled after the Englishman made contact while barging through on just the third turn.<\/p>\n<p>Feeling he should have been given the place back as he&#8217;d been squeezed toward the barriers, Piastri was overruled by McLaren, while the incident was merely noted by stewards.<\/p>\n<p>Arguably just a hard-but-fair racing incident, Piastri was adamant that Norris, who&#8217;d also clipped the back of Verstappen&#8217;s Red Bull just beforehand, had been reckless, saying over the radio: &#8220;I mean, that wasn&#8217;t very team like&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/team-mclaren-celebrates-after-winning-the-constructors-title-E744VW4YPRGQXDAS5DITJLOMIY.jpg\" alt=\"Team McLaren celebrates after winning the constructor's title during the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix at the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore.\" width=\"800\" height=\"449\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"ImageMetadata__MetadataParagraph-sc-hi5x8q-0 cWTYyG image-metadata\">Team McLaren celebrates after winning the constructor&#8217;s title during the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix at the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore. (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n<p>He then continued to complain: &#8220;So are we cool about Lando just barging me out of the way or\u2026 what&#8217;s the go there?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>When told the team would look at the clash after the race, Piastri moaned: &#8220;That&#8217;s not fair, that&#8217;s not fair\u2026<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If he has to avoid another car by crashing into his teammate, then that&#8217;s a pretty shit job of avoiding.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Piastri later had further cause for dismay when a slow pit stop effectively ruined any chance to make a late charge for the podium. <\/p>\n<p>The 5.2sec stop may have made all the difference as the Australian ended up just a couple of seconds adrift of his teammate by the chequered flag.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/mclaren-driver-oscar-piastri-of-australia-steers-his-car-dur-7CDKKRYSWFBQBF7JSJK7MJ3NJA.jpg\" alt=\"McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia steers his car during the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix at the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore,.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"ImageMetadata__MetadataParagraph-sc-hi5x8q-0 cWTYyG image-metadata\">McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia steers his car during the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix at the Marina Bay Street Circuit in Singapore,. (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n<p>Piastri&#8217;s lead over Norris has now been reduced to 22 points with just six races remaining.<\/p>\n<p>The real question is how the drama may shape Piastri&#8217;s approach for the rest of the campaign, as he had never sounded quite as disenchanted as this, even when ordered to hand back a place to Norris at the Italian Grand Prix after the Briton suffered a poor pit stop.<\/p>\n<p>Later, after his initial fury had subsided, Piastri was back to his more considered self, playing the team man again as he said: &#8220;Not the race I was looking for, but for the whole team, tonight is a combination of a lot of hard work over not just this year, but lots of years. So it&#8217;s a really proud moment for me to be a part of that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But he made it clear the issue was far from dead, explaining: &#8220;We&#8217;re obviously encouraged to share our views on what happened, and I did that, and I&#8217;m sure we&#8217;ll discuss it more.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p class=\"text-greyDarkFaded\">The morning&#8217;s headlines in 90 seconds, including hope the peace deal for Gaza will become reality, a league and sevens star is coming to the Warriors, and why your social feeds could soon be flooded with fakes. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n<p>Asked if he agreed with team boss Zak Brown&#8217;s post-race assessment that he and Norris were racing hard but clean, he added: &#8220;Yes, I think we do. I don&#8217;t think there was any intention of contact &#8212; but there was. I need to look at the replay.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Russell took his ninth career win in dominant fashion by 5.43sec, while his Mercedes teammate Kimi Antonelli was fifth. <\/p>\n<p>Lewis Hamilton was closing on the Italian near the end when the brakes on the seven-time champion&#8217;s Ferrari failed, with teammate Charles Leclerc then passing him for sixth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McLaren have been crowned F1 constructors&#8217; champions at the Singapore Grand Prix on a day when team harmony&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62117,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2300,85,111,139,69,213],"class_list":{"0":"post-62116","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-asia","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62116\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}