Image Credit: Jay Hirano
Well, after all that, the gap in the 2025 Formula 1 Championship has narrowed by just three points. The Italian Grand Prix has brought an end to the European swing. Lando Norris sits in second place with 293 points. The leader, his teammate Oscar Piastri, has 324. It’s all to play for with eight races remaining. In the strictly numerical sense McLaren’s battle at the top keeps on giving, but this week in the wake of a controversial driver swap at Monza, you have to ask if it’s really giving us what we want. Our protagonists in 2025, two young stars neck and neck in their quest for a first taste of glory, continue to play by the ‘papaya rules’. Team unity over all. I guess you can’t argue with the results. In the constructors, McLaren pull further and further away from the pack. The car is on another level. With both drivers delivering week in week out results, it’s become divide and conquer. As for the big show though, the drivers’ duel that we all tune in for, fans now find themselves divided and confused. What’s the point of this again? What is racing, and what isn’t it?
Drama aside, it was Max Verstappen’s weekend in Milan. A new lap record of 1:18.79 put him on pole. Evasive action then sent the Red Bull star off track at the first chicane, forcing him to give the place to Lando Norris in anticipation of a penalty, but he retook the lead soon after and cruised out in front for the remainder. A comfortable victory at the ‘Temple of Speed’, which lived up to its nickname and then some on Sunday. It was the fastest race in F1 history, a record broken for just the second time in the last 54 years. Max’s individual addition to the Monza record books was accompanied by one from Lando, who set a new high mark for lap times under race conditions. Both efforts also broke the all time F1 records for highest average speed in a qualifying/race lap at any venue. Alongside all the history making, there was some thrilling racing to watch early on. Piastri and LeClerc were locked in a risk-ridden back and forth throughout the opening laps. The Aussie came out on top in that fight for P3, but it was a serious display of skill and racing mettle from both drivers.
On another day it might have been all smooth sailing from then on. Instead, a pit crew mistake has brought us here, arguing once again about McLaren and their team orders. Piastri boxed first in lap 47 of 53, with Lando making his stop the following go round knowing there was no chance of undercutting Max for the lead. When the Englishman pulled in, an incomplete wheel change saw him stranded for four agonising seconds. The mechanic at fault, wielding the front left gun, didn’t recognise his error until it was pointed out to him in a panic by his teammate on the jack. Norris was stopped for 5.9 seconds all up. Hurtling down the main straight, Piastri was in the midst of being informed on strategy. The pit stops (he was told) were designed to cover off LeClerc. Once over he would have free license to race Lando in front. Just one problem with that. Lando wasn’t in front anymore.
Just as it was getting exciting again, McLaren made their controversial call. The team orders; swap positions, and then race. I can think of a few drivers who would have said something like ‘no way’, or maybe ‘are you taking the piss?’ A certain 4 time World Champion comes to mind. Verstappen had time to make his thoughts clear, relaxing way out in front of the pack. “Ha! Just because he had a slow stop?”, the Dutchman scoffed. Gentleman that he is, Oscar fell in line without fuss while still echoing all of our feelings on the decision. “Mate, we said a slow pit stop is part of racing, so I don’t really get what’s changed here… but if you really want me to do it, then I’ll do it.”
It’s hard to see precedent for this. The point of comparison that comes immediately to mind is the pit stop debacle last year in Hungary. McLaren’s race management that day was widely criticised for the opposite reasons. A stellar drive from Oscar had him out in front and heading to his first ever F1 win until, for some reason beyond all of our comprehensions, Lando was given the preferential strategy and allowed to undercut his teammate. In that case swapping positions was all they could do to avoid a major fallout, internally and in the public eye. Claims of favouritism are inevitable when an English team has an English driver who’s a chance at becoming World Champion. They had to make clear that their pit order that day was nothing more than an honest mistake. Taking that at face value, I’d argue that the real question McLaren were asked on Sunday was this: is an honest mistake from the mechanic on the wheel gun the same as an honest mistake from race strategists?
I think not. Evidently they disagree with me.
They’ve made their rationale clear enough. Norris took the second pit stop to give his teammate a better strategy against LeClerc, and because it was a team first decision that led to his misfortune, a team first move had to be made to rectify it. Respectfully, what a load of crap. You’re really having us on trying to convince fans that the pit strategy worked against Lando in any substantial way. A one lap undercut was never going to make up enough time for Piastri to get close. No strategy was going to make up enough time for Norris to be in the same postcode as Verstappen. If anything, the order they went with benefited Lando, covering off the slim possibility of being burnt by a safety car had he stopped first.
Whatever the variables McLaren’s strategists were weighing up, it had nothing to do with what actually happened to Lando. Strategy played no part in the mechanic’s mistake. That’s what so unsettling about this. Look, I’ll give them more credit than most do. McLaren’s thinking here is pretty simple; whatever needs to be done to keep the peace is what we’ll do. We have two elite drivers in their prime; an enormous privilege that even the other top tier teams can’t seem to create for themselves. This must be protected. Like in Hungary, the team have shown themselves averse to anything that could be perceived as pitting Lando and Oscar against each other. They will not be seen to be playing into the narrative. I can respect it. Sure, it’s no fun, but it’s probably the right way for them to go about things. Piastri ultimately accepted the decision. “Lando was ahead of me the whole race. I don’t have any issues with that, but we will definitely discuss it,” he said after the race. Ever the diplomat. We love you for it, Oscar, but I take the other view here and I hope Mark Webber is in his ear doing the same.
This decision is the worst of both worlds. It’s an unsporting act of contrition for an error that is, very simply, a racing incident, and through it McLaren have managed to slight both drivers while throwing a bucket of gasoline on the fire of ‘Lando favouritism’. It comes as an insult to race fans, that they believe it’s their responsibility to rectify bad luck. It flies in the face of why we watch this sport. Forget about past precedent, what kind does this set going forward? It’s not a ridiculous hypothetical to suggest that another slow stop is coming. They happen. What will they do if it happens with everything on the line, come Qatar and Abu Dhabi later this year? At what point do the fundamental values of racing take precedence?
Mercedes’ Toto Wolff has been asking similar questions. No one knows better how intense things can become when two teammates battle for the World Championship; he tried fruitlessly to play the peacemaker in 2016 when Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg’s lifelong friendship turned to a bitter feud. “There is no right and there is no wrong,” he said at a Monday press conference. “I’m curious to see how that ends up. You set a precedent that is very difficult to undo. What if the team makes another mistake and it’s not a pit stop, do you switch them around? What is a team mistake? What if next time around the car doesn’t start up and you lose a position or whatever, the suspension breaks. What do you do then in the next one? So you could have a cascade of events that can be very difficult to manage.”
The Formula 1 season will now take a brief break, before returning to the streets of Baku on the 19th for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Then to Singapore. Then the American swing: Austin, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, and Las Vegas. As November comes to an end, we’ll head to the Arabian Gulf for the final action. Toto went on to say, “[w]e are going to get our response of whether that was right today towards the end of the season when it heats up.” There’s an undeniable feeling right now that something big is brewing. I just hope when it comes down to it, we’re not talking about this anymore. It’s been a tense and at times fascinating Championship battle so far, the closest in years, and us Aussies have been all the way in from the start, buoyed by a wave of optimism. The wholehearted belief that, this December, we will see Piastri crowned as the first Australian champion since Alan Jones 45 long years ago. Whatever the result though, I think every racing fan wants to see it determined the right way. By skill, by strategy, and by the occasional act of god. Not by god damned team orders.
-Will Newby
