Andrea Stella does not want to be in Red Bull’s shoes when it comes to the driver pairing, and emphasizes that the Norris-Piastri pairing opens up “many opportunities”
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella is convinced that having two equally skilled drivers is an advantage, not a disadvantage. While Red Bull, for example, has a clear number 1 with Max Verstappen, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri are on an equal footing. Two completely different philosophies of running a Grand Prix team.
Stella would not want to swap with his Red Bull counterpart Christian Horner: “I still look at a lot of telemetry data myself, and I keep noticing that both drivers push each other and learn from each other.”
He cites Friday as a specific example: “If you look at the first free practice, they are almost complementary in where they are fast or slower. That opens up a lot of opportunities. And then I see a synergy. And that synergy raises the overall level. For me, that’s the biggest difference compared to the past. You can see it as pure vehicle performance. But for me, it’s the combination of the car and what the drivers get out of it and how they raise their own level.”
Both approaches have been successful in the history of Formula 1. Michael Schumacher, for example, was the clear number 1 in the team at Benetton and later at Ferrari – and in this way won seven world championships. From 2014 onwards, Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg fought against each other on an equal footing at Mercedes, and the team racked up one success after another.
“Papaya rules” and the discussions about them
McLaren has also had negative experiences with its own “Papaya Rules”. In 2024 in Hungary, for example, when Norris initially passed the then-leading Piastri during the pit stop and the team decided afterwards to correct the undercut advantage “manually” and let Piastri pass. Norris refused to follow orders for several laps before relenting. Heated discussions after the race were the result.
Stella “cannot rule out the possibility of something like this happening.” But: “As I said before, having two extremely competitive drivers brings great advantages. I think this advantage outweighs any other in the long run. From my point of view, this is what you want.”
“But there will always be situations where one of the two drivers is disappointed because the team had to make a decision or because the race developed in a certain way. We are very, very aware of this. Internally, we don’t talk about if it’s going to happen, but when it’s going to happen. Because we know this is a tough business. And the team, and Lando and Oscar, know that too.”
Piastri: Especially in qualifying, he’s getting closer
In 2025, it is noticeable in McLaren’s internal dynamics that Piastri seems to have further reduced the gap to Norris compared to his first two years in Formula 1. Norris leads the drivers’ championship with 62 points, while Piastri is third with 49 points. But Piastri is now usually right up there with his teammate, especially in qualifying. That was still different in many qualifying sessions in 2024.
“We can see that Oscar is simply more confident in qualifying. He is better at bringing everything together,” says Stella. ”I think he has developed greater awareness. That comes with experience and with all the analysis that was done over the winter. So we see a stronger Oscar. At the same time, as usual, we see a very strong Lando.”
Even if he still has problems with the handling of the current McLaren MCL39. In Melbourne, a driving mistake almost cost him victory, and most recently he lost pole position in Suzuka due to minor imperfections. The Norris-McLaren package is fast – but more prone to failure than the Hamilton-Mercedes package was in its prime.
“With Lando, there is one particular phase when driving when he is not completely comfortable with the car,” explains Stella. ”We now have a very good understanding of what this is due to. It would not be appropriate to give details, but I can say that we have made some adjustments to the car for this race itself.”
Stella leaves open what exactly that is. The update list submitted to the FIA for the Bahrain Grand Prix shows only one new wing profile in the area of the brake vents for McLaren. This serves to optimize the airflow and will presumably hardly contribute to making the car’s handling more predictable. The changes must logically be more in the set-up area.
Stella hints at this: “We are trying out a few solutions that we think could improve the predictability of the car for Lando’s driving style. So this weekend is also interesting from that perspective, and we are excited to see what we can learn from it.”
