Oscar Piastri on Lando Norris: “In the heat of battle, it’s easy to think selfishly”

The Hungarian Grand Prix saw a tense moment between the two McLaren teammates. At issue: Lando Norris, leading the race, was slow to give back the first place to Oscar Piastri, despite a team order. The Briton finally complied… but with a heavy heart. The atmosphere was not great in the “cool room” or on the podium, despite McLaren’s one-two finish.

In an interview at the Belgian Grand Prix, Oscar Piastri addressed this tension… To immediately defuse it and affirmed that he was still on very good terms with his teammate. « We didn’t really talk much about the race, we played Monopoly, so we are still on good terms, you know, everything is fine. There is a lot of respect between us and, you know, it’s mutual », he declared. If you want to know who won this game of Monopoly… It was Alex Albon.

Lando Norris was still very frustrated on the radio after the finish line. Which does not surprise his teammate. “I wasn’t surprised because it’s a race driver winning an F1 race, it’s natural to want to do it and give yourself every chance,” said Oscar Piastri.

It is easy to think selfishly.

« Maybe it lasted a bit longer (for him to let him pass, NDLR) than I had anticipated, but I think it’s also something we need to discuss as a team to see if there would have been more opportunities to fight if things had been done differently,” the Australian explained. « We discuss a lot of things as a team, but we can’t predict all scenarios, and this one, I admit, had shades that meant we were in an unprecedented position before the race. So I’m not at all surprised that he wanted to keep the lead.

« We all want to go out and win. Maybe it took a few more laps than I thought, but it still happened. “I think it’s extremely easy, in the heat of the moment, at the front of the race, to think selfishly.” But you have to race knowing that some decisions are made with the team in mind and that we are acting for the team,” added Oscar Piastri.

The Australian indicated, however, that the two drivers and the team had discussed this possibility beforehand. « We talked about it, you know, we drive for the team and we often found ourselves close to each other on the track, especially for podium finishes. This particular situation was quite nuanced and maybe we hadn’t fully discussed it, but there was an expectation that we would fight hard but fairly »,” he explained.

We have never had any contact, and we always keep in mind that certain strategic decisions, such as the timing of the second pit stop, are made with the team’s ambitions in mind. As I said, if we had raced against each other without caring about the other drivers behind us, it would have been very different, that’s for sure. But we had to care about the other cars. That’s why we acted this way, clarified the Australian.