There’s more bad news for Max Verstappen, with his closest rival given a huge boost towards ending his reign as Formula 1 world champion.
McLaren have confirmed that from this weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix onwards, Lando Norris will be prioritised in the championship fight.
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Second-placed British talent Norris currently lies 62 points back from drivers’ title leader Verstappen, with his McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri 106 points back in fourth.
McLaren have so far kept things even between the pair, even instructing Norris to let Piastri past him in Hungary after a strategy call inadvertently took the lead from the Australian as they keep to their ‘Papaya Rules’.
But, with McLaren now F1’s in-form team, things came to a head in Monza last time out when the duo were allowed to race.
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Piastri took the lead from Norris with a bold but fair move at turn four, but it was so bold that it dropped Norris down to third behind Charles Leclerc, who eventually took victory.
Verstappen, meanwhile, finished sixth, his worst on-track finish in 43 Grands Prix, meaning Norris missed out on crucial points in the Drivers’ Championship battle.
McLaren CEO Zak Brown and team principal Andrea Stella faced repeated questions over their decision to let their drivers sort things out on track, and Stella has now confirmed they will be reversing that strategy.
“We [will] bias our support to Lando but we want to do it without too much compromise on our principles,” the Italian told the BBC.
“Our principles are that 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.
“What we don’t want to see anymore is a situation like in Monza in which we enter a chicane P1/P2 and we exit P1/P3, because that is a detriment to the team.
“The team interests come first and these are the situations that above all we need to fix because as a matter of fact, the way we entered the race in Monza left the door open for this situation.”
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Discussing Piastri’s reaction to the news, Stella was full of praise for the 23-year-old sensation, adding: “The conversations have been very collaborative.
“Even when I said to Oscar: ‘Would you be available to give up a victory?’ He said: ‘It’s painful, but if it’s the right thing to do now, I will do it’.
“Every driver is hard-wired to go for a victory. So I am very impressed by the level of team spirit and maturity and collaboration that we found in this period.”
The news will come as a blow to championship leader Verstappen, who has very much had things his own way until now.
The Dutchman has won the last three drivers’ titles, and appeared to be heading towards a simple fourth when he started the season opener in Bahrain by winning by an ominous 22 seconds.
That gap has completely evaporated now though, and McLaren have the fastest car in F1 on form.
Through the European stretch of the season the Woking-based team picked up 286 points to Red Bull’s 182, and now sit eight points behind in the Constructors’ Championship – a remarkable turnaround given Red Bull’s complete dominance over the past two seasons.
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