Last Updated on August 29 2025, 11:25 am
This year the Formula One drivers’ title will be going to one of the McLaren duo. With Max Verstappen in third place in the standings but some 97 points behind Oscar Piastri the leader, the final ten races of the season will be about whether Lando Norris or his Aussie team mate becomes an F1 champion for the first time.
In their two prior seasons together Lando Norris with his four extra years of experience in the sport has been the clear winner in the McLaren team mate duel. He finished ahead of Piastri last year by a hefty 82 points which was an improvement for the Australian on his rookie seasons deficit to Norris of 108 points.
With McLaren building the dominant car for 2025, expectations were that once again Norris would come out ahead in the intra team battle at Woking, yet right from there off in Australia Piastri looked a different driver when compared to previous years.
Paddock narrative: Piastri he more complete driver
At the first race weekend of the year in Melbourne, Piastri demonstrated he meant business this season, missing out on pole to his team mate by a few hundredths of a second. In damp conditions on Sunday, the home grown kid pushed his team mate throughout the entire Grand Prix, before a late spin saw him tumble down to tenth place at the chequered flag.
Yet the paddock narrative since then has been that Piastri is ‘the more complete driver’ and that Lando Norris ‘makes too many mistakes.’ Yet is this the true picture we are being fed? The judge thinks not so lets explore why.
Of course Norris made a similar headline blunder to his team mates spin when in Canada he threw away ten valuable points. Unusually the McLaren’s were languishing in fourth and fifth place as the race came to its climax, with Norris harrying his team mate every inch of the way.
As Did Lewis Hamilton on team mate Jenson Button way back in 2011, Norris saw a gap on the home straight between the sister car and the barrier. But it closed ever so quickly and Lando who was committed to the move ended up in the wall.
Bizarre claim Oscar could be 61 points ahead
The idea that Piastri is rock solid and Norris somehow flakey is a narrative which has taken on a life of its own. Simply put the Australian driver has made plenty of mistakes this season other than in Melbourne. Even so the likes of F1’s Joylon Palmer continues to peddle this notion, suggesting on the F1 Nation podcast Piastri should be well ahead of his team mate except for bad luck.
“We’re talking about the fine margins, nine points, Lando winning three of the last four. But on pretty much all stats and viewing, Piastri has been the better driver so far. I looked through, and I think that championship lead that’s nine points could easily be 61 points, but largely for a bit of luck,” said Palmer.
Yet Piastri has dropped the ball on a number of occasions which for most of the time go unnoticed. In Miami, he was leading the race after torrential rain affected the start. Norris was in hot pursuit and a forced a mistake from his team mate at the turn 14/15 chicane. The affected tyres forced McLaren to pit their driver slightly early onto the slicks which would prove decisive.
Russell’s explosive Antonelli statement
Piastri costly mistakes in Miami and Imola
A safety car then neutralised the race and Norris claimed a free pit stop emerging ahead of his team mate going on to take the victory. But it was the mistake from Piastri which cast the die.
In Imola, Piastri had claimed pole position whilst his tea mate was to start the Grand Prix in fourth. Whilst the Australian driver made the initial better start, he was concerned about George Russell who from third was challenging on the inside of turn one. Oscar chose to block the Mercedes driver but at the same time he allowed Max Verstappen the space to make a move around the outside and take the lead of the race.
Piastri was the first of the front runners to make his first pit stop, having noticed the progress Charles Leclerc had made by stopping early an enjoying the undercut. This mistake of covering off the Ferrari driver, which he would repeat again in Hungary was to prove costly given Oscar would get stuck behind Verstappen’s team mate and fail to use the advantage of his fresher rubber.
Punished at the British Grand Prix
By the time the McLaren driver had cleared the slower cars, once again he was to suffer from the deployment of a virtual safety car. This gave Verstappen a free pitstop and by now the Australian’s race winning strategy was in tatters.
He was behind his team mate and hoping to make a fight of it with Norris, but on lap 46 Kim Antonelli pulled out of the race at Tosa and the race director decided to deploy the full safety car. Veratappen so far ahead pitted and retained the lead with Lando too stopping for fresh rubber and falling behind his team mate.
Oscar was now a sitting duck behind the safety car with Lando now on tyres 15 laps fresher. The inevitable happened on lap 58 as Lando breezed around the outside at Tamburello finishing the race over six seconds ahead of his team mate.
At the British Grand Prix whilst leading a wet race, Piastri slammed on the brakes as the safety car lights went out. With Verstappen sailing by in poor visibility, the stewards decided the McLaren driver had driven erratically and awarded him a ten second penalty which he served at his pit stop.
Strategic blunder in Budapest
This handed Norris the victory and Piastri clearly furious over the rare but fair penalty from race control was coded in his interview for third place. “Yeah, I’m not gonna say much. I’ll get myself in trouble, so…”
The last time out in Hungary, Piastri and McLaren decided again to cover off the early stopping Charles Leclerc. This committed him to a two stop strategy on a circuit where the tyre degradation is high, whilst Norris hung on for much longer and switched to a one stop strategy which won him the race. Piastri questioned how he and the team had played the strategic battle reflecting after the race “whether we should have done something a bit different in terms of strategy.”
Of course Norris has made his fair share of mistakes too, but the narrative that it is Norris is making the errors whilst Piastri is the complete driver, is not one which bears up to the scrutiny of the facts.
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With over 30 years of experience in Formula 1 as an insider journalist, I have built trusted connections across the paddock, from race engineers and mechanics to senior team figures. At The Judge 13, I and a handful of trusted colleagues share exclusive Formula 1 news, expert analysis and behind-the-scenes stories you will not find in mainstream motorsport media.
Norris v Piastri. Oscar has clearly had the legs of Lando in the last 3 races, but that has only translated into points once, through no fault of his own (the penalty at Silverstone was ridiculous). In fact, he’s been penalised in each case for being faster. And yet he’s still ahead in the WC. If things stay as they are, my money is firmly on him.