McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said he never doubted for a moment that Lando Norris would obey their instructions to let his team mate overtake him.
Norris kept McLaren waiting for lap after lap as his race engineer Will Joseph pleaded with him to let Oscar Piastri through into the lead. Piastri led the early stages of the race but Norris moved ahead when McLaren performed his final pit stop on lap 46, before his team mate’s.McLaren told Norris at the time he would have to be prepared to give the place back to Piastri. But Norris pulled further ahead of his team mate for over 20 laps during the final stint and only backed off to swap places on the 68th lap of 70.
Although Norris is McLaren’s leading driver in the championship and the closest threat to leader Max Verstappen, Stella said he never worried Norris wouldn’t give up the lead.
“I trust Lando 100%,” he told the official F1 channel. “I know exactly the nature of the two boys that drive the McLaren cars.
“Inside them there are two important aspects: The race driver and the team player. They are very well balanced and that’s why they are the McLaren drivers. There wouldn’t be space for drivers with different characteristics to drive a papaya car right now.”
Stella said he believed Joseph would be able to convince Norris that letting Piastri through was the fair thing to do as he’d benefited from the early pit stop which ensured he did not drop behind Lewis Hamilton
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“My trust was 100% and I thought it was more for Will [to handle],” said Stella. “I said ‘now Will I’ll leave you the difficult job, rebalance the race driver and the team player’.
“But I was absolutely trusting that Lando would collaborate to re-establish the order that was simply altered to protect the result of the team from having a problem at the pit stop today. So it’s sound from a team point of view.
“I feel very lucky, I have to say, that I can be the team principal of such a team and these kind of drivers.”
Both McLaren drivers have scored their first victories this season. Stella said the team’s latest triumph is “a special and important day for many reasons” as it underlines their status as championship contenders.
“It’s also important because it’s a milestone for the team in terms of our positive trajectory that we have established over the last year.
“So it’s very important but ultimately it doesn’t really change our mindset. Our mindset is to keep our feet on the ground, be determined, try to improve every day, and make sure that we can enjoy more of these kind of qualifying and races.”
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2024 Hungarian Grand Prix
- Verstappen names Hungarian GP the most stressful moment of his title-winning year
- McLaren team orders “a new situation we’re inexperienced at handling” – Piastri
- Verstappen dismisses critics of “vocal” radio messages and late-night simracing
- Norris’ former McLaren team mates say he was right to give up win
- Mercedes surprised Hamilton’s car was “completely unscathed” in Verstappen clash
Osvaldas31 (@osvaldas31)
21st July 2024, 18:52
From radio messages I never heard a clear order – ‘we let you stop first, you benefitted from it and avoided falling behind Hamilton, now let Piastri by’. Stella should have come with such message if Will couldn’t do it properly. I remember Ross Brawn in such scenarios, he was always clear. Of course, the situation itself was shoundn’t have happened in the first place, really strange to do such stuff and then swap places afterwards.
Aw
21st July 2024, 18:58
Oh come on, stella, please :)
PacificPR (@streydt)
21st July 2024, 19:01
McLaren made a huge mess of this. They should have owned up to their mistake. They should have apologized to Piastri during the race and let them get on with it. Now they made Norris relinquish a victory by putting him under enormous pressure – the team’s communication ‘you need the team to fight for championships’ ao – bordering emotional blackmail. I think they have gone way too far with this (in any other working environment this would be labeled and unsafe working relationship). Imagine if Norris never gets in a position to win again. If I were Norris (or Piastri for the matter) – I would seriously consider a drive elsewhere…
David BR (@david-br)
21st July 2024, 19:10
@streydt The main point is that they had to make some decision from the top: Stella had to get on the radio himself (as Wolff or Horner would have) and say either “sorry Lando, we messed up big time with the pit stops, we’ll make it up to you but can you move over now?” or “sorry Oscar, we messed up with the pit stops, we’ll do better next time.” Instead they left it is an ‘indirect’ team order for Lando to interpret, which really was a bit disrespectful. Assume the blame and recognize just how much they were asking of Norris, it would have been more dignified.
Mayrton
21st July 2024, 19:15
I have to agree here the team overstepped a boundary towards their driver.
MichaelN
21st July 2024, 22:22
From the bits included in the highlights it was obvious McLaren wanted the cars swapped around. Norris got the message, which is why he argued about it. Ultimately, Norris is there to drive McLaren’s car. Their reminder of this simple fact was exactly right.
There was an obvious way for Norris to prevent this; put himself in WDC contention with better results. Wins in Austria and elsewhere would have tilted the team strategy in Norris’ favour.
SteveP
21st July 2024, 19:06
Interesting. I have this magic* oil lamp he can buy for £1,000,000 I’m sure he’d trust me on that.
*It converts £1’s in to millions if you use it right.
Mayrton
21st July 2024, 19:12
Bit disappointed in Lando. You always take the win. You are there for a very short period in time as racing driver. Wins are not easily nor frequently available. There is no team for a driver, it is you. You know they will let you down the moment they no longer need you. He missed the opportunity to shake off his being too nice today which imho is the last step he needs (well actually he could work on his consistency as well) to become a WDC candidate. This will cost him on the long run.
debaser91
21st July 2024, 19:24
‘There no team for a driver only for you’. Spoken like a five-year old. That is a sure-fire way to annoy the hundreds of people working to try and give you the best car every week.
Mayrton
21st July 2024, 22:09
I understand there is an audience for processional racing. I am not part of that group.
Jungle
22nd July 2024, 10:53
There’s also an audience for no 1 status in a team. I don’t subscribe to that group either. # Peter Windsor
David BR (@david-br)
21st July 2024, 19:25
I think Norris could have thrown it back by asking openly, “OK, so if I let Oscar past, can we race still?”
I mean, I presume so given that they’d said they could earlier, but Mercedes always had that thing about not letting the drivers race after the last stop and they were set for a 1-2. If confirmed, Lando could have ‘returned’ the place and then immediately fought for the win. Risky, obviously, but the team would probably have come out of it looking and feeling better.
Dale
21st July 2024, 19:34
Change your Maxipad
BLS (@brightlampshade)
21st July 2024, 19:15
All this to cover Hamilton, who never looked a threat anyway.
Should have been firmer from the start with the team order. I understand Norris not wanting to swap back but tough. Oscar passed him on the track, Norris got him back because of a favourable pit stop.
WhereRmeslippers
21st July 2024, 21:40
+1
Red Andy (@red-andy)
21st July 2024, 19:25
McLaren soiled* the bed on this one, in all honesty.
Pitting Lando first to “cover Hamilton” who was nowhere near undercut range was a deeply stupid move, if their aim was to have Piastri lead the cars home. Not immediately pitting Piastri, but instead leaving him out for a further lap, only compounded the error. In fact, I initially thought McLaren had done it to swap their drivers around without using an explicit team order, to favour Norris for championship reasons.
Lando was a bit petulant after the stop, ignoring repeated coded messages about tyre-saving and also the more explicit ones about being a team player, but he should never have been put in that position in the first place.
We often see that teams who are not used to being at the front of the field tend to drop the ball on strategy, which sometimes leads to them losing races they ought to have won. McLaren were lucky that it didn’t come to that today, but should take it as a severe warning that they need to sharpen up their strategy game.
WhereRmyslippers?
21st July 2024, 21:42
Totally agree. Well said.
Mooa42
22nd July 2024, 5:42
I disagree. I think what McLaren want is to have two drivers who obey teams orders, so that they can insure that they get the best outcome for McLaren, now and in the future. They were correct to cover Hamilton, not just for the undercut but also for the chance of a safety car. It was an unlikely scenario, but they wanted to cover every possible outcome.
Ideally you want to win by the smallest possible margin, putting wear on engines and other components by 2 drivers fighting over a position that has no bearing on the team result might be good for our entertainment but could risk one or both drivers crashing out and put undue wear and tear on equipment. Making engines and other items last longer and be more reliable could be the difference between points and no points at a future race.
The drivers need to trust each other and the team needs to trust the drivers, then they know they can concentrate on getting the best result for Mclaren 1st and then drivers 2nd.
It would be different if Lando or Oscar was paying McLaren to provide them with a car, but when McLaren is paying their wage, then they are driving for Mclaren.
Kudos to Lando for giving the position back.
Dale
21st July 2024, 19:30
Stupidity.
In Lando they have a driver who has been with the team since being part of their junior programme, a driver who has committed long-term to the team even when his services were being pursued by winning teams, a driver who has be instrumental in developing the car to where it is today, and a driver who has consistently beaten or dominated all of his McLaren teammates … including Piastri by some margin on consistent performance.
And his reward from the team … a junior teammate given unearned equal status, & 7 points taken from his push to be the drivers champion … on a grid when some drivers might only get one shot in their career to be in that position.
I think it’s shocking how McLaren have handled this.
But then again, I think it was shocking how they poached Piastri as a junior driver from Renault … and how he behaved towards the company who funded his road to F1.
Judas Piastri strikes again.
roadrunner (@roadrunner)
21st July 2024, 20:53
How did Piastri “strike again” today?
Mark (@mrcento)
21st July 2024, 19:44
The mess is on the team. Horribly handled.
Lando ultimately did the ‘right’ thing undoing their own avoidable mess, but couldn’t have blamed him too much if he just held on to it. Ran his own race well and that’s where the calls the team made put him, not really his problem if that disadvantaged and put Oscar in P2.
Ultimately though, it’s some payback from the team for Oscar being shafted consistently by strategy in the past letting him have this one back, but do think IF McLaren end up in that situation again at another race, it’ll be Norris that will benefit as the lead driver now this one has been chalked onto the board for Oscar.
Sonny Crockett (@sonnycrockett)
21st July 2024, 20:42
Lots of very negative comments above.
This is McLaren’s 1st 1-2 on merit for over 10 years. They probably could’ve handled it better but they’ll get used to this kind of stuff if they carry on with this trajectory.
Ultimately, without Stella or Zak jumping on the radio, Lando obeyed team orders. McLaren aren’t Red Bull. They are trying to build a successful team by doing what they think are the right things. Win or lose as a team. We all have different perspectives, but I’d take their approach over that of Red Bull and their whining no. 1 driver (who might as well be their only driver), who even annoyed his own team today.
David
21st July 2024, 21:45
Ugh! Verstappen was such a cranky baby today. Obviously over tired from missing his bed time and skipping his nap.
I like Max’s driving, the agression is fun to watch, but his cranky attitude leading to poor judgment today is too far. If I was a team manager I would be telling my driver to adjust his priorities.
Jungle
22nd July 2024, 10:39
Nice comment Sonny.
AlanD
21st July 2024, 21:15
I really dslike use of team orders at the best of times. TOday was one of the worst of times.
There have been plenty of races where a team messes up a pit stop, but they don’t go on the radio to the other driver and tell him to swap positions in the interests of fairness. Norris may have had the advantage from his earlier stop, but he still drove the car to a six second lead. I can see no reason why Norris was expected to give up his deserved race win.
MichaelN
21st July 2024, 22:26
In the highlights they include that Piastri was told the second Norris pitted that they would sort this out.
So Piastri likely wasn’t trying to catch Norris. It’s easy to build a small gap when the other guy is driving at a managed pace.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
22nd July 2024, 2:49
Agree with michael and I really have a hard time seeing how this would be a deserved race win for norris, he got behind through his own fault on a track where track position is very important, he only got ahead because of a team decision (giving him the undercut), not through performance.
AlanD
23rd July 2024, 0:51
Es: “he only got ahead because of a team decision (giving him the undercut), not through performance.”
How many times have we seen races won because a driver got ahead because they pitted at a different time to the driver ahead, or they had a pit stop faster than their rival in the race. Are you saying that those drivers did not deserve to win their races?
David BR (@david-br)
21st July 2024, 21:29
Peter Windsor takes an interesting angle. Not sure he’s right about Piastri diving into the first corner at the race start, he got a better start than Lando Norris, but he does have a point about Piastri effectively pushing his team mate off track (see 23 seconds in). And also about Piastri later running off track later in the second stint, allowing Norris to close the gap and so, effectively, get past him via the undercut.
I also agree that McLaren are messing about with team etiquette niceties when their competing against a ruthless racing team in Red Bull and equally ruthless driver in Max Verstappen. McLaren need to wake up. If they and Norris had converted other pole positions this season, the gap to Verstappen would be far less and we’d already be talking about a title challenge. It’s a possibility for the second half of the season but they seem to be operating as ‘not quite contenders’ still.
DaveW (@dmw)
22nd July 2024, 0:33
As for Piastris win being tainted, I recall Hamiltons podium for Mercedes in Malaysia in 2013 was essentially gifted by team orders. There were howls at the time given that he was the new driver in the team etc. His reputation recovered.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
22nd July 2024, 2:51
It’s not about reputation here, it’s about the feeling of the first win, it’s a very special feeling, hamilton talked again about his canada 2007 win recently, and that was sort of taken away from piastri due to giving him the unfavourable strategy when until that point he was a fully deserving winner, always ahead and building a gap.
Michael (@freelittlebirds)
22nd July 2024, 4:09
Mega from Norris to let Piastri by but at the same time, it ain’t like this was his 10th win.
It was his 117th start for McLaren with 1 victory and their #1 driver.
Now Stella is in the unenviable position where he has to offer Lando 9 wins and if there’s any doubt, he’ll have to sacrifice Piastri’s position without a second thought.
And if Norris had won today, he would have had 196 points and been closer to Verstappen. It’s too early to talk about it but Norris is 2nd in the WDC. Imagine if Norris loses the WDC championship over this victory. McLaren will have no one to blame but themselves.
McLaren need to pick a driver and back him and that driver has to be Norris given his spot in the WDC. I’m sure they’re not back Leclerc or Sainz since they drive for another team.
Congratulations to Oscar – he did good at the beginning but he also he also didn’t have Mad Max on the outside.
Michael (@freelittlebirds)
22nd July 2024, 4:11
Oops, and congratulations to McLaren for a Mega result.
Mog
22nd July 2024, 8:08
mclaren, in trying to be fair, ended up looking silly. This is is why teams like merc and red bull have a number one and the second driver is not allowed to actually compete. Also why they keep their team orders private whilst publically pretending there are no team orders.
MurasamaRA300 (@murasamara300)
22nd July 2024, 8:51
I’m guessing the bosses at McLaren already know they aren’t going to catch Verstappen for the drivers title. What they can do is get Piastri (5th in the standings) to close in on the Ferraris in 3rd & 4th, which he did. Piastri also added another 10 points between himself and Hamilton (6th). All boxes ticked.
Realistically, McLaren can aim for 2nd and 3rd in the final driver standings – plus having a shot at the constructors title if Perez doesn’t up his game soon. The team orders must have been a success seen from that perspective.
José Lopes da Silva
22nd July 2024, 9:17
Piastri’s first win came in the weekend that both Alpines qualified dead last and one of them was the only DNF, mechanical.
Let’s hope this coincidence puts a definitive end to the idea that somehow he should have stayed at Alpine.