Lando Norris was unable to capitalize on Piastri’s retirement in the battle for the Drivers’ Championship in the Baku race, ultimately finishing in 7th place.
After Oscar Piastri’s retirement on lap 1 of the 2025 Azerbaijan Grand Prix, his teammate Lando Norris could have made up a lot of points on the championship leader. But the Briton couldn’t get past seventh place in Sunday’s race at the Baku circuit.
On Saturday, Norris was unable to capitalize on Piastri’s crash in Q3 during qualifying and also missed out on a better starting position for the race, finishing seventh:
“Sure, yesterday should have gone better, but we were the first to go out—that was our decision, and we paid the price for it. Could I have done things differently? Yes. But I could just as easily have ended up in the wall and the whole thing would have turned out even worse,” said Norris after the race in Baku.
Restart and mediocre pit stop seal a dull Sunday
Nevertheless, the 25-year-old reduced the gap by six points to 25 points in the Drivers’ Championship. After the early safety car phase, Norris initially lost the direct duel against Leclerc and fell back to eighth place. Norris had “problems with the temperature of the brakes” and had to “get them to work properly in the first place,” as he explained after the race. He therefore concentrated “less on the restart itself.”
Strategically, things didn’t go well for McLaren either. A long stint with hopes of a safety car or red flag ended on lap 37. But the pit stop was also mediocre at 4.1 seconds.
McLaren car “partly on a knife edge”
As a result, Norris was stuck behind Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda in the DRS train and was unable to make much of an impact. Even Lewis Hamilton, who had swapped positions with Charles Leclerc via team orders, put the Brit under pressure towards the end of the race.
“I think yesterday’s result reflected the performance quite well. To be honest, we weren’t really fast today either. It wasn’t disastrous, but I could hardly keep up with Tsunoda,” said Norris.
The car was simply difficult to drive this weekend. The current second-placed driver in the world championship describes it as “partly like walking on a knife edge.” Either it was too slow, or “you feel like it’s just right, but then it suddenly locks up and something goes wrong.” As Piastri’s result also reflects, the balance of the car “didn’t give the McLaren drivers much confidence” this weekend, according to Norris.
Two-way battle becomes three-way battle?
Looking ahead to the rest of the season, the Brit knows “that I still have a lot of points to make up—against a damn good driver—an incredible driver. For me, that means keeping my head down and continuing to work. I give my best in every race,” Norris continued. “If you like, every race I’ve finished second or worse in this year has been a missed opportunity. But honestly, I don’t care how people see it.”
“I think we’re still struggling on tracks with less downforce,” Norris continued. “We just don’t have the confidence we need yet. The car can be fast, but we can’t deliver that performance as consistently as Red Bull, for example. We’re having a great season, don’t get me wrong. But there are clearly areas that aren’t good enough—and we need to keep working on that.”
However, with a 25-point gap to the championship leader, the situation could quickly change in the remaining seven races. Another zero points finish for Piastri and a win for Norris would mean a tie. And then there’s Max Verstappen, who is confirming his rising form with another win, as McLaren team boss Andrea Stella suggests. The World Championship duel could actually turn into a three-way battle.
