McLaren has offered the firmest hint yet that it is now ready to throw its full support behind Lando Norris’s Formula 1 title bid, despite having been reluctant to introduce team orders so far.
Amid a growing reality that championship rivals Red Bull and Max Verstappen are on the back foot, McLaren team principal Andrea Stella feels that the moment has come for his team to ensure opportunities to maximise Norris’ points-scoring chances are not wasted.
Norris only finished third in the Italian Grand Prix, with an aggressive opening-lap move from team-mate Oscar Piastri to snatch the lead helping open the door for eventual winner Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc to get between them.
With Norris now 62 points behind Verstappen with eight races to go, McLaren is aware that helping him as much as possible could make the difference in the outcome of this title chase.
Talking about Verstappen’s belief after the race this his title chances were now “not realistic” and what that meant for McLaren, Stella said: “Max is good, even with his tongue. He’s not only good on track.
“Obviously he knows that the car he is driving at the moment seems to provide him with some challenges.
“But we need to be better at capitalising the opportunities that Red Bull at the moment seem to offer by not being in the usual possibility of competing for podiums.”
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-24, 1st position, Oscar Piastri, McLaren MCL38, 2nd position, Lando Norris, McLaren MCL38, 3rd position, on their slow down lap
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Stella explained that, while both Norris and Piastri remained in mathematical contention to win the championship, the team had to be realistic that it was starting to make sense to back the one with the most points.
“We are fighting Max Verstappen, so I think if we want to give support to one driver, we definitely have to pick the one that is in the best position,” he said.
“And also Lando, he’s been doing very well, like pole position in Zandvoort, pole position here [in Monza].
“If anything with Lando, we need to adjust some little racing things which may help him, and may help us capitalise on a pole position like we had here in Monza. I think if you look at his first lap, while we review it together, we might see that there were a couple of things that we could have done slightly better.”
But while acknowledging that the team wants to “give it a go at the championship with Lando”, Stella thinks that will not entail a situation where Norris is installed as clear number one.
“I think number one kind of works well as a headline, but I’m not sure it works very well in the real world in terms of what does it mean? What do you do?,” he said.
“Let’s say hypothetically that we conclude that in corner four [the second chicane], Lando just braked too early, and Oscar kind of naturally had the possibility to take the lead, then what does it mean if you are number one? You swap the lap after?
“It’s just very difficult to implement this definition in the real world. It’s better to keep working as a team, get the opinion of both drivers and then work together to pursue this objective in both championships, because it now looks like the drivers’ championship is definitely a possibility.
“We were a little cautious even before Monza, but I now we see that McLaren can compete in circuits where last year we were not competitive.
“So I think it’s a very competitive package overall, and this could be a very important weapon for Lando in particular in the quest for the championship.”
Asked if any thought had been given to swapping Piastri and Norris in the closing stages of the Italian Grand Prix, Stella said: “We did not consider that.
“We considered other ways during the race to make sure that Lando had his own opportunities.
“But we didn’t consider the swap because we were still willing to put as much pressure as possible on Leclerc and eventually induce him to have a problem with the front left, like a lock-up, in one of the chicanes.”