After dropping the ball in the past two weekends, McLaren seem to have rediscovered their dominant pace at the Brazilian Grand Prix this week. Oscar Piastri grabbed pole for the sprint race, with his teammate and championship contender Lando Norris qualifying in P2.
Although Norris qualified two places ahead of his championship rival Max Verstappen, he refused to answer a query regarding the Dutchman, stating that he hates such questions. “I don’t care. I hate these questions so much,” was Norris’ response in his post-sprint qualifying interview when asked if things were looking good for the championship battle so far.
He added, “I don’t care about where he qualifies. For me, it is just focus on my own job. That’s it you know…It’s the same question every time but it doesn’t matter if he is first, if he is last“.
While Norris has claimed that he does not care about where Verstappen qualifies or finishes, the same cannot be said about the Dutchman. At least by looking at the way Verstappen has raced Norris in the past few races.
Verstappen pushed the rules to the limit at Austin and escaped by finishing ahead of Norris despite pushing the Briton off track on one occasion while defending against him. However, similar tactics didn’t work for him at the very next race in Mexico City when he got not one but two 10-second penalties.
He received his first penalty for pushing Norris off track and another for gaining an advantage by overtaking the McLaren driver off the track. Following Verstappen’s aggressive driving, several experts criticized his driving style.
Some like Martin Brundle even suggested that Verstappen would be hurting his legacy by driving in a way that many would deem ‘unfair’ and unsportsmanlike. However, Verstappen does not care.
