Lando Norris won the sprint race at the São Paulo Grand Prix for McLaren with the team choosing to employ team orders to have his teammate Oscar Piastri cede the lead to maximise the British driver’s points advantage over world champions Max Verstappen, who finished in third Piastri was second, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz were fourth and fifth.
Piastri led from pole for the entire race until lap 22 of the 24 when he moved over for his teammate but the team had made it clear early in the sprint, their intent was to switch the two drivers in Norris’s favour and Piastri had been explicit beforehand he would not have an issue doing so.
‘I’ve said I would when we had these discussions,” he said earlier in the weekend. “It would be nice to win, but it’s a one-point difference and it’s not the main race, so we’ll see. Lando needs the points in the driver standings a lot more than I do.”
The victory continues Norris’s comeback at Verstappen in the championship battle and was vital in once more edging closer to the Dutchman. Norris has taken a further two points from his rival, closing the gap to 45-points with 112 available from one further sprint and four races to come.
With the pressure on Norris to close the gap at every opportunity the British driver, Piastri and McLaren acted collectively to make the most of their chance in the sprint. The pace of the McLaren will give him great optimism he can take another chunk out of Verstappen’s lead in Sunday’s GP, with the Dutchman already penalised with a five-place grid penalty for taking a new engine.
Piastri had held his lead into turn one with Norris tucked up behind and Leclerc just holding off Verstappen in third.
The McLaren’s had good early pace, opening a gap within the early laps as Verstappen pushed hard at Leclerc, while Norris questioned his team as to their tactics, suggesting he had already expected Piastri to cede the place to his teammate.
Clearly Norris was concerned and more so when Piastri pulled out of DRS range, leaving the British driver being caught by Leclerc and Verstappen. Developments almost certainly not within McLaren’s plan for a one-two, demonstrated when the team then instructed the Australian to keep Norris in DRS range. Norris was then informed the team would hold position until the last lap.
Verstappen and Leclerc remained hard to separate, with the Monegasque defending well against a concerted effort from the world champion, until lap 18 when Verstappen finally made it stick at turn four. The Dutchman in clean air duly set off after Norris and when Piastri allowed the British driver past he was left dangerously close to a charging Verstappen.
A late VSC neutralised the racing until the final lap when Verstappen came at Piastri just as the race went green once more but the Australian just held the place to the flag. Verstappen is under investigation for potentially going too early at Piastri when the VSC was still in place, for which he may face a penalty.
He and Red Bull will, however, take great heart from the pace their car demonstrated. Having been outpaced in qualifying, when it mattered the Red Bull showed enormous speed and importantly, given Verstappen’s grid penalty, he was able to put it to great use in coming back toward front and crucially being significantly quicker than the Ferrari.
He and the team will now be optimistic that they have every chance to do so again on Sunday and at very least minimise the potential points loss to Norris, a result which would be welcomed from a weekend where taking the new engine was expected to be a setback.
