Lando Norris told to copy one Max Verstappen driving technique to become too fast for Oscar Piastri

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Lando Norris heads into the European F1 season swing needing to beat Oscar Piastri to close the gap in the title race.

The Briton has dropped over 20 points in the title race after colliding with Piastri at the end of the Canadian Grand Prix, forcing him to retire.

Piastri overtook Norris in the championship after the Bahrain Grand Prix, and the Briton struggled to match him since having made a lot of unforced errors in qualifying.

Nico Rosberg called it a ‘watershed moment’ in Canada, and is now backing Piastri for the title after seeing his consistency.

Analysing his qualifying performances on his YouTube channel, Peter Windsor thinks Norris must copy Max Verstappen in one area after studying his data.

Peter Windsor says Lando Norris should ‘shorten his corners’ to maximise exit speed

Windsor pointed out Norris’s data from the fast and sweeping right-hander of Acqua Minerale corner at Imola, and believes there is one thing he should do after seeing similarities to Piastri.

“Norris is doing a little bit of what Max Verstappen does. He’s going in quicker [to the corner] than Oscar Piastri and he’s got a slower rotation point, but he’s not actually gaining a lot from that because he’s not shortening the corner,” said Windsor.

“He’s not giving himself a longer straight and it’s not the same as a Max Verstappen rotation. If Lando shortens his corners, he does have that touch to get the benefit of that.

“It will be interesting to see how Oscar and Lando compare around Austria. But I thought it was interesting how two different drivers bring out the same result on the same piece of tarmac, I’m sure McLaren will be pretty happy about that.”

Lando Norris trails Oscar Piastri in qualifying head to head

Norris and Piastri are close on comparisons after the first 10 races of the season, but surprisingly it is the Australian ahead in qualifying.

Piastri has had more front-row starts than Norris this year, despite qualifying often being his main weakness last season.

The Australian has also beaten him in Sprint qualifying on both occasions so far, with Norris only beating Piastri in the number of fastest laps during a race so far this season.

It’s clear Norris must improve his qualifying if he wants to stand a chance of closing the gap to Piastri, especially now that clean air is often seen as favourable during races.