McLaren will give Lando Norris priority over teammate Oscar Piastri in the Formula One championship battle with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, team principal Andrea Stella told the BBC on Thursday.
Britain’s Norris is second overall and 62 points behind triple world champion Verstappen with eight rounds remaining, plus three sprint races, while Australian Piastri is fourth and 106 off the lead.
There are a maximum 232 points still to be won in the drivers’ championship. McLaren are chasing both titles and could go top in the constructors’ standings at this weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku, with the team only eight points behind once-dominant Red Bull.
“The overall concept is we are determined to win but we want to win in the right way,” Stella told the broadcaster. “We [will] bias our support to Lando but we want to do it without too much compromise on our principles.
“Our principles are the team interest always comes first. Sportsmanship for us is important in the overall way we go racing, and then we want to be fair to both drivers.”
Stella said McLaren wanted to avoid a repeat of the situation in Monza where Norris lined up on pole position with Piastri second but ultimately lost out to Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
In that race, Piastri overtook Norris at the second chicane with Leclerc seizing second place from the Briton, who had to slow, before winning on strategy.
Once-dominant triple champion Verstappen is on a six-race losing streak and finished only sixth in the most recent round in Italy, won by Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
Tough race
The Dutch driver won on the shores of the Caspian Sea in 2022 but Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez has the better record there and is the only driver to have triumphed twice.
“Monza was a tough race and it is our priority to get our form back to where it needs to be,” said Verstappen, who has spent time in the factory simulator ahead of the first leg of a double-header with Singapore.
“The team has been working hard to improve the issues we have been seeing with the car from the past few races.”
In Monza, Verstappen had described his car as an undriveable monster.
While Red Bull have won the last three races in Baku, Leclerc is chasing his fourth successive Azerbaijan GP pole position with his team only 39 points behind Red Bull with eight rounds remaining.
The Ferrari driver, and teammate Carlos Sainz, could be contenders for victory at a tricky circuit that combines fast slipstreaming on the straights with tricky, twisty turns through the old town.
“We have usually been quite competitive here and it is also one of Charles’ favourites. We are on a high after the win in Monza and we are determined to maintain this run of form,” said team boss Fred Vasseur.
Mercedes also have reasons to be optimistic, despite difficult recent races in the Netherlands and Italy, as the only team other than Red Bull to have won in Baku.
“We head to Baku aiming for a better performance than we showed in Zandvoort and Monza,” said team boss Toto Wolff.
“We have the opportunity to show we have done the necessary learning and made improvements both for this weekend in Azerbaijan and the next week in Singapore.”
Kevin Magnussen will be absent from the starting grid, the Haas driver triggering a one race ban for accumulated penalty points.
Ferrari reserve Oliver Bearman, who will be taking the Dane’s place next season, stands in — for the second time this season after replacing appendicitis-stricken Sainz at Ferrari in Melbourne.
Reuters
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