{"id":122679,"date":"2025-09-08T10:39:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-08T10:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/122679\/"},"modified":"2025-09-08T10:39:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-08T10:39:06","slug":"piastri-and-norris-say-team-is-priority-no-1-amid-mclaren-team-orders-controversy-formula-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/122679\/","title":{"rendered":"Piastri and Norris say team is \u2018priority No 1\u2019 amid McLaren team orders controversy | Formula One"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri have both insisted that protecting their teammates was central to McLaren\u2019s use of team orders at the Italian Grand Prix<\/a> and that they were focused on long-term success that would be fostered by doing the right thing, despite criticism after they were instructed to switch places at Monza.<\/p>\n

The Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff, however, also noted McLaren\u2019s adherence to such strongly held principles of fairness for their drivers may yet cause them serious headaches later in the season if Norris and Piastri end up toe-to-toe for the title.<\/p>\n

Max Verstappen won at Monza<\/a> but McLaren\u2019s use of team orders, having Piastri return second place to Norris after the British driver lost the position due to a slow pit stop caused by a faulty wheel gun, prompted no little controversy given the pair are in a two-horse race for the title, with Piastri now leading by 31 points.<\/p>\n

The drivers and team principal Andrea Stella concurred that it had been the right thing to do as part of the agreed racing principles at McLaren but the drivers also emphasised that they felt it had also been part of a bigger picture looking to foster a positive environment within a McLaren team intent on going on to win further titles.<\/p>\n

Both drivers were explicit in urging that they did not want any member of the squad to feel they had been responsible for having an impact on the result.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve said many, many times now that we don\u2019t want the chance of this success just for this year,\u201d said Piastri. \u201cWe\u2019re both at McLaren for a very long time and protecting the people around us that give us this opportunity is a very important thing. It\u2019s easy enough to put yourself second at times like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want it for as long as possible and protecting the people includes the people doing the pit stops. It\u2019s not a very nice feeling, I would imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n

His opinion was wholeheartedly backed by Norris.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team is priority No 1 and drivers second,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s how it works. It\u2019s only our second year of fighting for wins but the team gives us these opportunities. Without the team, then we\u2019re just fighting for 10th and none of us want that. The spirit of the team is priority and we are below that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lando Norris, who took second place to Oscar Piastri\u2019s third at Monza, now trails his teammate by 31 points in the drivers\u2019 championship. Photograph: Joe Portlock\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Wolff managed what became a fractious and bitter intra-team battle between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg in 2016 which he described at Monza this year as \u201ctwo lions in the den\u201d who were \u201cat each other\u2019s throats\u201d, but was intrigued how the McLaren commitment to fair play between its drivers would play out.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere is no right and there is no wrong,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m curious to see how that ends up. You set a precedent that is very difficult to undo. What if the team makes another mistake and it\u2019s not a pit stop, do you switch them around?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are going to get our response of whether that was right today towards the end of the season when it heats up.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also observed that how McLaren micro-manage the myriad potential variations for scenarios between the teammates will likely become only more complex.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is a team mistake? What if next time around the car doesn\u2019t start up and you lose a position or whatever, the suspension breaks,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat do you do then in the next one? So you could have a cascade of events that can be very difficult to manage.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri have both insisted that protecting their teammates was central to McLaren\u2019s use of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":122680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1687,372,6537,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-122679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-f1","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}