McLaren secures the championship amidst the chaos of the Norris-Piastri incident.
"Anyone on the grid would have reacted in the same way"
McLaren clinched the 2025 Constructors’ Championship in Singapore, but their victory celebrations were dampened by a dramatic first-lap collision between teammates Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. The incident occurred when Norris attempted to overtake his teammate, leading to a heated exchange on team radio.
"That wasn’t very team-like, but sure," Piastri expressed angrily. He later questioned, "Are we okay with Lando just pushing me out of the way, or what’s the situation here?" When his engineer informed him that McLaren and the stewards would not take action, Piastri reacted vehemently: "That’s not fair. If he has to avoid a crash by crashing into his teammate, then that's a really poor job of avoiding."
Norris, who also made contact with Max Verstappen’s Red Bull during the same maneuver, rejected accusations of being overly aggressive. "I hit Max, so it wasn’t aggressive towards my teammate," he replied with a smile.
"Anyone on the grid would have done the same thing I did," Norris continued. "If you blame me for going on the inside and placing my car in a large gap, then I think you shouldn’t be in Formula 1. The last thing I want is to collide with my teammate, especially since I receive constant questions from you all. I have more to lose compared to him.
"But the FIA clearly thought it was fine, and so did the team. So that’s that."
Piastri's irritation persisted even after the race concluded. When CEO Zak Brown congratulated him over the radio—"Oscar, back-to-back champions. Tough race. Thank you for uh ..."—he abruptly ended the conversation.
Witnesses observed Piastri being discreetly taken aside by McLaren’s press officer before he faced the media. When asked if McLaren's drivers still raced each other fairly, Piastri hesitated before responding. "Um, yes I think we do," he eventually said after a pause. "I don’t believe there was any intention of contact, but there was, and I want to review the replay to understand exactly what happened."
When pressed on whether team rules might change as a result, he replied, "I need to review the replay before making any comments."
Team principal Andrea Stella acknowledged that McLaren’s so-called 'papaya rules' are adjusted from race to race as they navigate the championship battle, and he saw no problem with Piastri’s passionate radio remarks. "We want our drivers to express their opinions freely on the radio," he stated. "In this instance, we felt there was no reason to intervene."
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