Minus 30. It’s not the arctic temperature of one of the coldest places on the planet, but it is the distance – reduced – to which McLaren has moved from the top of the Constructors’ World Championship standings to the leading team, Red Bull Racing.
Lando Norris’ victory, his second in the current World Championship, has reopened a debate that seemed closed for weeks and now McLaren is all the favourites thanks to an MCL36 that has effectively become the reference car from a performance point of view.
The Woking team is fighting together to achieve a world title that has been missing in Formula 1 since 2008, when Lewis Hamilton brought the Drivers’ crown to England in the final corners of the Brazilian Grand Prix, outwitting Ferrari and Felipe Massa.
But that’s not all, because thanks to the success obtained in Holland, Lando Norris has moved to 70 points from Max Verstappen in the Drivers’ Championship with 9 races left to the end of the season. Not many, but not so few as not to dream of a sensational comeback.
McLaren, up to now, has not given team orders favoring the leading driver because, up until Zandvoort, it has never designated who was the number 1 between Norris and Oscar Piastri. With the current standings, things will continue to be the same, but Norris – should he really need it – will receive help from the team. Word of Andrea Stella.
Vertrag “um mehrere Jahre verlängert”: Andrea Stella bleibt McLaren-Teamchef!
Photo by: Motorsport Images
“We have always discussed team orders, right from the first race. Because you always want to go into a race with a clear idea of how to manage the internal competition between the two drivers. Conversations about team orders therefore take place during the season, but they have to be put in the context of what is, for example, the drivers’ standings. In general, our approach is to be correct, to have, as we say, integrity in the way we race. And I keep repeating that I don’t know any driver who wants to be number one by contract.”
“Drivers want to be number one because they’re fast on the track. And then when you’re fast on the track, you definitely want to be supported by the team, when it’s a 50/50 decision, or, you know, like if you have eight good weekends, and one weekend where you’re struggling a little bit, then that weekend the team can help you, right? But there’s no driver that… we have nine races ahead of us and we create a number one driver, and then what do we do? All the favors to the number one driver? That’s not a healthy way to run a team.”
“But for each race we will analyse the situations, and in the 50/50 situations, or in the cases where – in this case, Lando might need a little bit more support from the team – we will give it. But the team also includes Oscar. For example, the team should not do things that do not seem reasonable to Oscar. We are together. You don’t go as a team and as a driver and the other driver follows him despite him. He has to be part of this conversation and he has to agree with what we think is the way forward.”
In short, a small opening towards a hierarchy that is currently struggling to be defined. But if Norris were to recover many points on Verstappen in the next two races – and the scenario is far from impossible – then McLaren will be ready to change the cards on the table. Because, as we know, two titles are better than one and the appetite comes with eating.
#Stella #Team #orders #Lando
