🔗 Share this article

Despite the hype around the Sin City Grand Prix, Lando Norris is maintaining a calm demeanor regarding his prospects of claiming his maiden drivers' championship.

The British driver presently has a two-dozen point lead over fellow McLaren driver Oscar Piastri and is ahead of Max Verstappen by 49 points, with only up to 83 points up for grabs across the remaining trio of events. But, after staging a extraordinary recovery from a significant deficit Piastri following the Zandvoort race in August, Norris is focused on performing with the methodical approach that propelled him to the lead of the standings.

"It can easily turn in the other direction again even though I hope it doesn't," he commented. "That's racing, as we all know. Sometimes you get lucky. You can also be unlucky. Whatever it may be. It's no point getting excited or dwelling on it. I continue to do see it as something that's quite far away."

Norris has discovered his best form at a critical moment—after difficulties with the car in the first part of the campaign—at the same time that Piastri has shed the disciplined, nearly perfect ease that had for so long made him seem to be a future title winner. Importantly, Norris maintained a impressive level of composure all along, asserting despite setbacks—like his withdrawal from the Zandvoort race—that he would adhere to his strategy and work each session with the same relentless attention to detail. It has paid off.

All the while, the team have worked hard to attempt to maintain a fair competition for their pair of racers, and it has at times been a rather torturous process, especially at Monza when the team instructed the Australian to surrender the runner-up spot to Norris after he had lost the spot due to a slow pit stop. Some fans were unhappy with what was considered McLaren needlessly interfering with their competitors.

The championship leader has won the previous pair of grands prix, in Mexico and São Paulo, and was booed on the winner's rostrum at both, yet he remained unfazed. "Once you are leading, many individuals try to undermine you. They don't want to see you winning. I consider it a good thing," he remarked.

"It just makes me laugh. While standing on the podium in Interlagos, I really loved it. It was quite enjoyable. At last you sense that you are achieving success.

"I don't mind, provided that I win. As long as I feel like I am competing the right way, and I think that's the case, as long as I feel like I am dedicating hard work into being who I am and those kinds of things, then I'm not too fussed about the rest of it."

Vegas, on the other hand, needs to be mastered, and it is not a track suited to the British team. It shares similarities with Canada and Baku: low downforce, cool temperatures, and slippery surfaces. These are the sole pair of circuits in the current championship where the papaya squad have failed to claim at least one top-three finish, and Norris was circumspect once more about their prospects in Nevada. Still, his objective in the immediate future is simple: end the race in ahead of his teammate and the points he needs will come.

Friday Running Shows Mixed Results for Title Rivals

Charles Leclerc topped the leaderboard in FP1 on what was remained a sandy and extremely low-grip surface. The Williams racer was runner-up, with the Red Bull star fourth, Norris in P6, and the Australian eighth. During the more representative night running of second practice, Norris was fastest from the Silver Arrows of Kimi Antonelli, with Piastri 14th; though, the practice was interrupted for nearly the last third of running to check a suspected unsecured drain cover at the penultimate corner.

This problem is treated with caution on a street circuit where, at the first Las Vegas GP held in 2023, a dislodged drain cover struck the Ferrari, heavily harming it and leading to the session to be aborted.

The German Team Announce Ownership Transaction

Mercedes have revealed that their boss Toto Wolff has divested a fifteen percent share in his holding company, equating to a five percent ownership in the team, to American billionaire the cybersecurity magnate. Kurtz is the CEO and founder of the cybersecurity company CrowdStrike. The team principal will stay on as boss and could earn as much as £230m from the deal, with the Brackley-based outfit having been appraised at £4.57bn, a record for an Formula 1 constructor.