Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri relay the opposite things that have happened to the two F1 title rivals, where the Brit has improved while the Australian is facing issues.
It has been a turnaround of sorts for McLaren’s Norris, who has come back from behind to now take a lead of 24 points against teammate Piastri in the F1 world championship fight. The Brit has left behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen as well, with three races and a sprint remaining.
His first part of the season wasn’t as good when compared against Piastri. The opposite is now taking place, where the Australian has struggled and races like Baku, Austin and Mexico has made things tough for the youngster of 2.5 seasons against his experienced teammate.
Piastri pinpoints Austin and Mexico as the ones which derailed his campaign off-late, where fundamental issues on low-grip surface was hard to understand. In races like Baku, Singapore and Brazil, he felt he had pace, but things didn’t work out for him due to other factors.
He admitted that the Monza team situation did play a role, but he was glad to have that kind of experience and learn from the hard conversation. For now, he can only hope to win F1 races to cut on the deficit and step on the top step of the podium of the world championship.
On the other hand, Norris stepped up after Zandvoort and has looked confident in the last few races when Piastri has struggled. He does notes that the front suspension and steering updates helped his case to challenge the Australian and push him around after losing out early on.
He also revealed that both he and Piastri are not undertaking funny videos together, not because of any rivalry for the championship, but both wanted to tone down on that side of things. Norris added on the psychological aspect of things and not caring as hugely about what others think of him.
Revival after Las Vegas 2024 to now –
Norris: “I mean, because we were so bad, I just ended up trying as much stuff as I could. And it was more just – actually, I’m not going to say. I’m fighting for a lot, so I want to reveal the least amount possible. But I think we were so bad that you just get to a point where you try a lot. I mean, it’s probably not too difficult for people to figure out. But yeah, it’s a long race, a lot of laps, and we were struggling consistently with the same thing. So I was just experimenting with a lot – experimenting with my driving, with driving styles, approaches to the car, which is not always easy, trying to figure out how the car likes to get driven because it changes every weekend, and with the toys and things like that.
“So it was more… Yeah, it took us to the end of the race, the final stint, to really try and figure out what was a bit better. We found pace. Like, even if you look at the race trace now, you can quite easily see the final stint from me was a lot more in line with Ferrari, Red Bull, Mercedes. I think Lewis’ last stint last year was pretty incredible. So we’re still quite a long way off what the Mercedes was, but we looked more raceable, let’s say. It was just too little, too late. I think we’ve learned from that. Doesn’t mean this year’s going to be mega, but it’s certainly given us a direction to go in. So it’s more experimenting with different things. But I’m not going to tell you. So, yeah, you can try to figure it out.”
Points show title in control or not –
Norris: “I don’t know. I think because of the weekend that I had last time out… I don’t know what the points swing was prior to Brazil and then post-Brazil – or even if you say prior to Mexico and then post-Brazil – it was a lot of points. And I feel like I’ve very much been on top of a lot of things the last few weekends, but it’s a very difficult level to perform at all the time. And I have incredible drivers that I’m up against. So, you know, my expectation for myself is to try and perform at the same level, but that’s not always a guarantee. And I know that it can also just change very quickly – whether it’s because you get unlucky or whether you’re not performing at the perfect level and the guys I’m up against can perform at that high level.
“Things can change very easily. So, of course, I feel maybe a little bit more in control, but at the same time, you’re not in control of any of these situations. And I’m not thinking of it apart from just going out and taking one session at a time, maximizing FP1 and then FP2. And as long as I treat it like that, it doesn’t… I don’t feel like I’m in a different position to what I was in Brazil. From the exterior, it’s clear that it looks that way. But inside, I think it’s treated as completely normal and just keep going as I am.”
Extracting more, change from earlier in the year –
Norris: “It’s hard not to do a better job than what I was doing at the beginning of the season. I certainly struggled at the beginning of the year, and we’ve changed some little things on the car that we think – not all of them are even guarantees. We’ve spoken about that in previous races and stuff. But the things with the front suspension and steering – some of it, we think it’s better, we think it’s going to help us and help me, but it’s not a guarantee. So that’s helped at times. And even when we put it on, it wasn’t like, “Oh, this feels way better.” It was more like, we think it’s better.
“If you don’t feel anything, we’ll just leave it on because we think it’s better. But the rest of it is more up to me and just trying to figure it out myself and with the group of people that I have around me – my engineers, my full team. So I certainly feel like I’m doing a much better job. I certainly feel like I’m executing laps better in qualifying and performing very well in the races – good starts, good restarts, all of that, the smaller things, let’s say. So I’m definitely doing a better job, but it’s not come without the work behind it all.”
What change and when –
Norris: “I mean, I would love to say yes, but it’s not, you know? It’s just a constant amount of work that I do with my team to always keep finding little things. It’s not like I’ve gone out and said, “This is how the car needs to be driven.” I still struggle now. One weekend to the next, it changes. Mexico, Austin – completely different feelings. Brazil – again, completely different feelings. So, it’s not like you figure it out and then everything’s easy. I still, every weekend, just have to adapt a lot to how the car wants to be driven. But there was never one thing. It’s just a lot of things that I’ve been doing on the simulator. I’ve been spending time with my team trying to figure out and adapt to having better procedures of working through FP1, FP2, FP3 – to try and understand more about the car and the way it needs to be driven. So I’ve just had to step up more than ever in terms of my work ethic, my understanding of all of these things, get more out of the people around me, and then get more out of me at the same time – and just work more than I ever have done before.
“So, no magic thing. Just work away from the track. I mean, what’s done me so well the last few weekends is by going flat, staying out of trouble, staying out of the chaos behind. It’s almost a safer bet in terms of pushing. So I think it’s not the right mindset to have. I come here this weekend to try and win. I’ll go to Qatar to try and win. I still treat it as if I’m not in a championship – I’m just here to try and win this weekend, and that’s the mentality I’ll have. Of course, when you’re on track, you make different decisions depending on risk levels and things like that. But I feel like my judgement of that generally is pretty good and pretty accurate. So I’m happy. Yeah, for me, it’s another race weekend. Nothing changes because of whatever points I’ve got.
Relation with Piastri, no videos –
Norris: “No. I think the reason you see less videos is because we both asked to do less videos. We’re racing drivers. We want to come and drive, not make videos for social media. So yeah, that’s our request as drivers. But we still get made to do plenty. Otherwise, it’s still the same. And I’m very happy – I think we both are – that that’s how it is. It’s not because that’s just how it is, it’s because we both have a lot of respect for one another and we both understand the position that we’re in. And we both treat the world of driving versus just personally what we’re like away from the track quite differently. That’s how I’ve always been. I feel like I’ve always got on well with my teammates since karting. I’ve always wanted to because it just makes my life more fun, more enjoyable, and that’s also why I’m here – because I love what I do. So the more I can do that, the better. But we still very much understand that we work for McLaren, we want the best for the team, we work very hard.
“And, as drivers always do, you try and maximise your own performance more than anything. But then when we step out of the car, we can still have a joke, we still have laughs in our debriefs, and we still enjoy everything away from the track. So, no. I think it’s still better than ever in many ways. I think we’re still very different people. Like, he’s very calm, down to earth, very relaxed – always looks, just cool. And that’s something I admire quite a bit – how plain sailing he is with a lot of things. It’s a good attribute to have. Always hard to read what mood he’s in, but… and I think probably for me, you see more visually the moods I’m in. But otherwise, it’s not like we go play golf together and do things like I have done with Carlos. Daniel – I didn’t play golf with, but, you know, we’re still different people. But in terms of relationship – we get along well, we still work together well, and I think it’s still better than it’s ever been.”
Complain of car and yet excel –
Norris: “I think it’s a challenge for everyone. One thing I’ve learned is everyone complains about the car – no matter if you’re in the quickest one or the slowest one, you’re at the front of the grid, back of the grid. We complain now, and we have consistently the best car. Yeah, like, everyone always complains whether you’re first or last. That’s just what we do – we do that very well as drivers. That’s our specialty probably more than anything. But yeah, I think a car can be very quick, and can always be very quick, it’s just sometimes very difficult to kind of put it in the line that it needs to be. And we’ve certainly opened up that window of workability and drivability this season, and that’s what’s allowed us to be a lot more consistent at a lot more places. But it’s still very difficult. And like I said, it changes a lot, track to track. One weekend I have to drive like this, the next weekend… I mean, I win this race, maybe the next weekend I try and do the same thing because it worked, and I’m way off the pace and just clueless for a minute in terms of understanding how I’ve got to do it. So now I’m able to judge things better and work these processes out faster.”
Mindset change, mental game –
Norris: “This could easily be like a 10-minute answer, so I’ll try and keep it short. Good group of people around me. It’s probably as simple as I can keep it. I have a very strong – and I’m very proud to have – a very good group of people around me to support me, to direct me, help me in all of these different cases, whether it’s been a good weekend or a bad weekend. People who always have my best interest at heart and are there to especially keep me and give me the right mentality when I’m down and I’ve not had a good weekend. So I feel like two reasons I’ve done well are: one, I’ve done a better job, so I’m performing better more often; and two, I’m not always more positive, but I’m more positive and less negative about when I have bad days and bad sessions. And I believe in myself a bit more that I can turn it around. There’ve been a lot of races this year when I’m like – I get post-qualifying even, and I’m a bit lost. Especially at the beginning of the year – just off the pace, don’t have an answer, don’t have a clear, “Okay, tomorrow I need to do this and I’ll be fine.” I’m just… timings of things are off, I’m not driving well.
“But then I turn it around – and I turn it around either into qualifying from practice, or I turn it around onto Sunday. And I’ve done that a good amount of times where I got to a point where even if I have a bad weekend now, I’m like, “Well, I’ve done it before against all the best drivers. I’ve been off, and I turned it around come the time it matters.” And that’s a very reassuring feeling that I need. That is always very welcome, I think, as a driver to have when you’re inside the car – is that “I’ve done it before, I can do it again” kind of attitude. So there’s, again, not been a key thing. There’s not been a “this” or “that”. But like I said, a lot of work away from the track with different people. A lot of work at the track. But it all starts with my team around me. I actually – let’s say in terms of where I am now, a lot of the result of where I am now is from a mental side. A lot of it is – I’m in this position because of the beginning of the season. Like, I’m almost happier that I had a pretty crappy beginning of the year – bar obviously a couple of races in Australia and things like that. But those difficult times certainly allowed me to focus, and I started to do a lot more work on all of those things to improve them, which has led me to be in this much stronger position that I am now. So there’s not been a moment. Actually, I think even if you go back to probably my post-race interviews in Zandvoort – things like that – I was pretty upbeat. Not upbeat or happy with what happened, but for the position I’m in, fighting for the world championship, going in whatever it was – 35 points down or something – I wasn’t too deflated about the situation.
“I was obviously gutted and not happy, but it wasn’t like I came in and I was just deflated about everything. Even on Saturday – Oscar got on pole by one hundredth, I think, split us. Tiniest of margins. Again, it wasn’t like I was like, “Game over.” I was still pretty upbeat about things. The race pace was still reasonably strong. So I think it was prior to that. Everyone says and refers to Zandvoort as being that moment that turned things around – but already prior to Zandvoort, I think I started to be on the right track. Zandvoort, I would have finished second. Oscar was always going to win there, but that was just a big step back in terms of positioning. But the change had already started by that point. So I think by the time we got Zandvoort out the way, it gave me a bit more time to kind of refocus, and then it was more evident – which I think is why you probably use Zandvoort as that turning point.”
What has gone wrong, what can be done –
Piastri: “Yes, largely yes. I think Austin and Mexico were quite different to the other races that have not gone so successfully. I think there, there was a clear pace deficit and something pretty fundamental that just wasn’t working. I think the other races have just been a combination of different things going wrong. Obviously Baku was what it was, Singapore from a performance standpoint actually was pretty solid, just the race obviously didn’t pan out exactly how I wanted and I think even Brazil, the pace was good at points. I think the sprint crash didn’t have a great impact on the rest of the weekend either. There were some things resulting from that that were suboptimal for the rest of the weekend, so I think from a pace and performance point of view, I think Brazil was actually quite good. It was just that there was a lot of things that happened that meant the results weren’t on the table. For me it’s not been kind of, yes, there’s been a string of races that have not gone very well, but I don’t think they’ve been along the same lines.
“I think Austin and Mexico were, but the other races have just been, the performance has been there, but there’s been something going wrong, whether it be a mistake or a crash or something else going wrong, a penalty. There’s just been things that have hampered the results, so I don’t really look at it as kind of a, it’s all been going wrong for the same reason what’s happened. There was a couple of races where, yes, I needed to do some head scratching and work out what was going on, but the other races that have been tough have just been what some might say is a difficult world of motorsport. It would certainly help, but I think for me, the best thing I can do, and what I try and do every weekend, is just get the most performance out of myself in the car. If I can do that, then I can put myself in the best position to try and win the race, and that’ll help me with the championship. That’s kind of all I’m focused on at the moment, all I have been focused on, really. That’s not going to change. Obviously, it’s going to be difficult now to try and win, but the mentality of trying to go into each weekend and getting the most out of it is still exactly the same.”
Change anything –
Piastri: “Not necessarily, no. I think the first half of the season was incredibly strong. I think, again, like I said before, even the last few races, there’s not been…Yes, there’s been a couple of races that have been learning experiences, but there’s also been a lot of moments that have been difficult to go through. But I think I’ve learned something from each of those moments. No matter how tough that has been, there’s been something that’s helped me in the future from all of those events. Would I have liked the results to have been better? Yes, of course, but there’s going to be bumps along the road. Not everything is going to be perfect. Ultimately, I think trying to learn lessons and not just set myself up for this season. I want to try and obviously win at any opportunity I get for the rest of my career. Sometimes some of these tough hills to swallow are part of trying to make that happen.”
Monza being on mind –
Piastri: “Yeah, there’s definitely been some tough moments through the year and some tough conversations as well. That’s part of the game when you’re fighting for a championship, things matter a lot. You’re going to have, again, those bumps in the road or things that you need to work out together as a team. I’m sure there’s no one on the grid that’s sitting there perfectly happy with every decision that’s been made, whether it be from their team, from the stewards, from how they’ve driven themselves. It is all part of it. Again, there have been some tough conversations through the year and some things to sort out and realign on, but I’m in a very comfortable place that we’ve done a good job of that as a team.”
Here’s Lando Norris on being confident and mindset change
