Button: Piastri may be allowed to choose pit-stop timing.

      Zak Brown at a press conference in Austin refused to say what the “consequences” might be for McLaren’s drivers if they continue to break the team’s fairly obvious rules, i.e. collide with each other on track.

      The chief executive of McLaren Racing then stressed: “This is a private matter that concerns only us and those people who need to know.” At the same time he assured that Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris have every right to continue to compete.

      Because the team’s drivers, when speaking to journalists, also mentioned possible consequences they were warned about at a meeting at the Woking base following the Singapore Grand Prix, many experts and commentators are now guessing what this might refer to.

      We’ve already given some opinions, but here’s what Jenson Button and Martin Brundle said about the topic on Sky Sports.

      The 2009 world champion suggested that McLaren might give Piastri priority in choosing strategy: “The team owner or team boss always tells you the same thing: don’t crash into your teammate. But usually that’s something of a warning, after which you calmly get on with preparing for the next race.

      But Oscar and Lando are fighting for the title, not for 10th or 11th, and perhaps they’ve now been given their only chance to fight for the world championship. So they should be given every opportunity to do that, and it’s possible Oscar will be allowed to choose the timing of the first pit stop, i.e. which car goes into the pits first.

      After all, we’ve already seen that such an option is possible – it may be for that reason the team doesn’t want to talk about it.”

      “Clearly, how they plan to act will remain an internal team matter and won’t affect the nature of their fight with rivals,” Martin Brundle continued. “Although it’s all a bit strange. I think McLaren do a lot of good for our sport when they allow their drivers to fight each other from start to finish, but on one condition: ‘Don’t crash into each other.’

      Of course, there will be consequences if that rule is broken. If, in Singapore, Piastri hadn’t been alongside Norris’s McLaren, the team would have praised their driver for how he behaved in the opening corners. And he was driving brilliantly then, except he clipped his teammate’s car.

      I suppose that if intensive development of the car continues, Oscar would be first to receive technical updates or be given priority to use a slipstream during qualifying. All of this is an internal McLaren matter and does not give any advantage to the other teams.”