Max Verstappen heads into the Formula One season ending triple header in control of the drivers’ championship. Now 62 points ahead of Lando Norris with just 86 on offer, the Red Bull ace is on course to claim his fourth consecutive title should he finish ahead of the McLaren driver in the night time race along the strip.

Norris entered the recent weekend in Brazil full of optimism and his win and the McLaren 1-2 in the Sprint looked to have set him on his way. Max was just fourth in the shorter race form having received a five second driving penalty for breaching safety car protocol.

Come the Grand Prix Lando would start from pole position. While Verstappen appeared to be having the nightmare weekend he and the team would have dreaded. Max was caught out battling for track position with Esteban Ocon when the second qualifying session was red flagged as the Aston Martin of Lance Stroll had spun at turn three.

 

 

 

Huge opportunity for Norris in Brazil

Max failed to set his second push time and was out of the session. To add insult to injury the team had decided to give their champion driver a new engine, which was outside the regular allocation for the year, which meant Verstappen’s P12 was quickly to become P17 after the FIA penalty was applied.

McLaren have had the quickest car for the most part since Miami with Lando Norris claiming seven pole positions across the twenty one races completed. Yet it seems the young British driver has an Achilles heel to his driving style given on six of those occasions Lando has failed to retain the lead by the end of the first lap.

The same was true in Brazil, with George Russell blasting away from the line and into turn one first. Norris feebly explained later he felt the wet conditions were worse from his side of the grid. A big points haul for Norris would have seen him close the gap significantly from the 44 points where it stood following the Sprint at Interlagos.

A gap of around thirty points to Max with three Grand Prix and a Sprint in the offing would have set up the final run in of mesmeric proportions. But it was not to be.

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The ill fated pit stop

Norris was begging the team to pit him for fresh intermediate tyres as he completed lap after lap in the wake of the Mercedes driver. The team finally relented when a VSC was deployed which should have seen Russell and Norris switch tyres and return at the head of the field.

Yet thee incident requiring the VSC was mild enough for it to be cancelled, just as Norris and Russell had committed to the exit lane entry.

Meanwhile in what some have described as the F1 drive of this century, Verstappen was carving through the field like a hot knife through butter. Crashes, pit stops and brilliant overtaking moves into turn one meant the world champion was now in third when Norris and Russell pitted.

The unfortunate timing of the VSC withdrawal saw Verstappen, Gasly and Esteban Ocon all take track position at the head of the field and then within a lap of the change of lead, Franco Colapinto hit the wall bringing out the red flag. This offered the leaders a free change of tyres which had cost Norris and Russell  over twenty seconds in time lost.

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Norris demeanour changes

At the restart Norris lost control in turn one, dropping back two further places and even with the assistance of his team mate Piastri, Lando could only manage sixth place and just eight points to Verstappen’s 26 which included one for the fastest lap.

Such was the imperious nature of Verstappen’s drive he set no less than seventeen fastest laps across the course of the Grand Prix and came home just under twenty seconds ahead of his nearest rival.

Norris appeared to be bitter later in the paddock with how events had in fact turned out. He described Verstappen’s win as more down to “luck, than talent,” before conceding he had himself made one or two mistakes which cost him “a place or two.”

Dutch F1 journalist Ruud Dimmers claimed to have observed a change in Lando’s demeanour after the race when speaking to the RacingNews365 podcast, suggesting the 24 year old looked almost “relieved.”

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“Relief” the title battle is over

Dimmers suggests that Norris first title battle has been a huge burden for the Englishman and now its over he can “relax” during the remaining events. The Dutch writer also suggests there have been noticeably fewer instances this year of the usually “nice and optimistic” Lando Norris who barked “I don’t care” at a young reporter following their question about the title race with Max.

“Actually at the end of that race in Brazil, it seemed as if he was almost just relieved,” Dimmers said. “He had been running races for a long time with his heart on his sleeve. He was really happy when he had the pole position. We saw that boy from before – nice and optimistic.

“And now the championship pressure came in, whether it was a real title fight or not. In Brazil, it was done. He looked like [he could] breathe out and relax.”

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No F1 title battle is easy

Its arguable that Norris has never been in with a realistic shout of the 2024 F1 drivers’ title. The closest Norris has been to Verstappen was 44 points following his win in the Sao Paulo Sprint.

That said the team have conspired to throw any hope of a drivers’ title away, with their refusal to issue team orders in Hungary and again later in Monza. Failing to switch their drivers in these two Grand Prix alone cost Lando ten points making his  chase down of Verstappen ever more forlorn.

In the constructors’ championship, Ferrari are bearing down on McLaren now just thirty six points behind the Woking based squad. Last time out in Las Vegas, the Scuderia looked strong with Leclerc leading the race only to make a mistake as his tyres faded allowing Max Verstappen his umpteenth win in what proved to be a record shattering season for Red Bull and their Dutch F1 champion.

If Dimmers is correct, then Norris needs to toughen up before next year’s campaign because as Lewis Hamilton will testify, wining an F1 title against Verstappen is never the work of a moment.

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Williams to miss the Las Vegas Grand Prix

Formula One is seeing unprecedented times. At the recent Sao Paulo Grand Prix, qualifying was postponed from its regular Saturday slot and listed for sunrise on Sunday morning. 

Further due to the torrential rain expected on race day, the mandated four hour time period between qualifying and the race was shortened to two and a half hours which meant Williams did not have the time to rebuild Alex Albon’s car following his crash in qualifying.

Moving a Grand Prix forward an hour and a half was also unprecedented in the modern era as the sport is highly sensitive to the scheduling of the TV companies who bring in around 25% of F1’s revenue… READ MORE