From McLaren’s point of view, the 2024 Italian GP has become a source of much contention. Many argue the Woking outfit should’ve deployed team orders to swap Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri’s positions towards the end of the race. However, The Race’s F1 expert Samarth Kanal argued the team did not want to risk asking the Australian to back off.
The suggestion for a position swap between the two is floating around because many believe Norris can still win the drivers’ championship. With eight races to go, every point is crucial as he’s now 62 points behind the leader Max Verstappen.
With a position swap between Norris and Piastri, he could’ve gained three additional points. When multiple fans asked questions surrounding this scenario, Kanal explained that McLaren may not have wanted to risk asking Piastri to move over this early on in his career and alienate him, despite the Aussie matching Norris on pace.
“If you start to enact team orders that strongly, you risk alienating one of the drivers. And you don’t want to take that risk with Piastri, because he’s performing quite high level.”, he explained.
Kanal added, “You know, he’s doing a great role, and I won’t say a second driver because he’s proven himself not to just be that, but he’s doing a great role helping McLaren. So why risk alienating him and pushing him out?”
Despite his age, Piastri is quite mature and has proved himself multiple times in his short F1 career. So, making him back off for his teammate for a far-fetched drivers’ championship title challenge may not have been worth the risk for McLaren, says Kanal. Even Norris defended this notion about Piastri’s race. He did not believe the Aussie should’ve sacrificed his position.
Norris admits he’s not going to beg anyone for a position in the race
McLaren experienced a hint of how uncomfortable F1 sometimes can be during the Hungarian GP. Building on that, they decided against issuing team orders in the Italian GP. However, Norris was on the losing side in both Hungary and Italy. Despite that, the Briton admitted he’s not going to beg for positions to gain additional points.
When asked if he would’ve liked his team to intervene, Norris said, “When you’re fighting for a championship, you want every little thing and I’m doing everything I can. The best way simply is just to win the race and I didn’t do that today because of some silly things. So yeah, this is for the team, not for me.”
Norris wants to win the championship with his caliber and not with a helping hand from his team or his teammate. However, if needed, Piastri wouldn’t certainly mind giving the Briton a tow whenever needed or moving out of his way to gain him more points.
But McLaren need to decide and have a conversation with the Aussie to get him on the same page. As for the constructors’ title, the Woking team seems set to clinch it with both drivers delivering consistent podiums.
