McLaren loses points in the Singapore Sprint following a collision: Norris defends himself, Piastri remains calm – Ralf Schumacher criticises the team
Two team-mates collided at Turn 5, but nobody at McLaren found it funny. Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri collided with each other shortly before the end of the 2026 Formula 1 Sprint in Singapore, losing what had seemed like secure fourth and fifth places. In the end, only Norris saw the chequered flag – in eighth place.
The 2025 Formula 1 World Champion had triggered the incident when he attempted a pass in the closing stages. “It was very difficult to overtake. And in the end, there was a good opportunity to overtake, but obviously that didn’t turn out particularly well,” Norris explained to Sky.
He said he “just gave it a go. The gap then got a bit tighter than I would have liked, and of course I had to back off. Because the gap closed, I had to try to avoid the incident. And obviously it happened anyway,” said Norris.
He doesn’t blame himself: “I have the right” to attempt such a manoeuvre, Norris explained. “We’ll analyse the rest as a team.”
Oscar Piastri’s take on the collision
Piastri agrees: “I’ll have another look at it, and the team can do whatever they think is necessary.”
Piastri himself seemed relaxed during his interview with Sky: “It’s about fourth and fifth place in a sprint race, so it’s not particularly important to me either way. But of course it now means a lot of work for the team to repair both cars. That’s why it’s just a shame for the team.”
Piastri said he didn’t see Norris’s move coming: “I didn’t see him at the apex. I looked back before the corner and saw that he was still quite a long way behind for a corner like this.”
Why Ralf Schumacher blames McLaren
Meanwhile, Sky pundit Ralf Schumacher is calling for understanding towards Norris: “That sort of thing is in a racing driver’s nature. If it had worked out, everyone would have said: ‘Lando Norris, wow, that’s brilliant.’ You make a decision like that in a tenth of a second. And once you’ve got that far, you can’t take it back.”
“He drives into it and realises: ‘Oh, this isn’t going to work.’ He lifts off the throttle, but by then it was too late.”
Schumacher also blames McLaren for the collision happening in the first place. He emphasised that he sees “a bit of blame” lying with the team. “Two laps before the end, the team needs to say: ‘Antonelli’s coming, please don’t mess up now. Hold your position, take the points home.’”
Audi driver Nico Hülkenberg expresses his gratitude
But in the end, it was Audi driver Nico Hülkenberg, rather than Piastri, who took home World Championship points – the first for Audi in a Formula 1 sprint race. McLaren deserves “all the credit” for this, Hülkenberg told Sky. “Without their help, I’d have finished ninth. But that’s how it is in motorsport – a lovely gift.”
The FIA Stewards investigated the incident between Norris and Piastri. The verdict: no penalty. Both drivers were deemed to have contributed equally to the collision, and neither was found to be primarily at fault.