What amazed Lando Norris said after looking at Oscar Piastri’s McLaren data

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Oscar Piastri is proving to be an increasingly difficult opponent for Lando Norris at McLaren. It’s only his second season F1, and he’s growing in confidence with each race.

Looking solely at the head-to-head, Norris appears to be the dominant driver within the team. He leads the qualifying head-to-head 14-2 – only Max Verstappen (16-0 vs Sergio Perez) has a bigger advantage among active pairings – and he’s 11-5 up in the races too.

But that disguises the reality that the margin between the two is often small. On average, Norris has been less than a tenth faster than Piastri on a Saturday (0.092 seconds).

What’s more, the Australian is only 44 points behind in the championship – enough for McLaren to prioritise Norris for the final eight races, but small enough to suggest he could challenge for the title himself in 2025. Piastri bullied his way past Norris at the start of the previous race in Italy, perhaps forcing the team to reassess.

The 23-year-old has won one of his first 38 races (the Hungarian GP in July) and taken seven podiums. Having established himself as a wonderkid by winning Formula 2 and Formula 3 in successive years, he’s widely regarded as a future F1 world champion.

Lando Norris couldn’t believe the speed McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri was taking through some corners

Speaking on the Dale Jr Download, McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown assessed the strengths of his two drivers. When discussing Piastri, he commended his ‘bravery’.

At times, the youngster carries so much speed into corners that even Norris is amazed. The duo will routinely study each other’s data to ensure they’re extracting the maximum from the car.

“He’s very brave,” Brown said of Piastri. “When you look at his speed traces, he has big corners. There’s a few times I’ve seen Lando ask ‘how did he do that?’”

One thing that has eluded Piastri up to this point is a pole position. Norris has collected four so far this year, while his teammate has been second quickest just as many times.

Zak Brown hits back at McLaren critics ‘on the couch with a beer’

McLaren came under fire for allowing their two drivers to race on the first lap in Italy. If Piastri had fallen into line behind Norris, then they could have taken control and significantly boosted their chances in both championships.

In the end, Charles Leclerc was able to get between them and steal victory. Leclerc executed a brilliant one-stop strategy to catch McLaren off guard.

But Zak Brown issued a defiant response to the critics ‘on the couch with a beer’. He assured them they don’t know how to ‘run the team’.

Piastri is now ready to give up a win if required to help Norris win the championship. The gap heading into the Azerbaijan GP stands at 62 points.