Martin Brundle shares F1 contract clause amid Lando Norris tactic suggestion

Admitting he was “conflicted” on Lando Norris yielding to Oscar Piastri in Hungary, Martin Brundle felt Norris waited far too long and cost himself the chance to fight back.

Looking to cover the pacy Lewis Hamilton behind, McLaren – with their drivers Piastri and Norris running P1 and P2 respectively – brought Norris in for his second and final stop before Piastri, resulting in Norris getting the undercut on his team-mate and taking the lead of the race. From there, things got tricky.

Martin Brundle feels Lando Norris yield came too late

McLaren instructed Norris to allow Piastri back through into the lead, but Norris initially was not playing ball, instead extending the gap. But with three laps to go, Norris conceded the lead and ultimately the win to Piastri. Brundle feels Norris’ approach was a mistake, arguing Norris should have yielded early and then gone on the attack for the win.

In his Sky Sports column , Brundle wrote: “Comfortably in the lead, Norris became reluctant to make this swap. He ignored radio calls to slow his pace to protect the tyres and to let Piastri through. Then he began to argue that he was fighting for a championship against [Max] Verstappen and so needed the extra points, already being 47 points ahead of Piastri on race morning.

“Lando then suggested if Oscar could catch up, he’d let him through. The team radio calls became ever firmer and more impassioned but stopped short of team principal Andrea Stella having to intervene with a direct instruction.

“One of the core clauses in any F1 contract is that you will follow team instructions at all times, and this is a long-standing problem given that in F1 you are employed and drive as a team, but you race, score points, and are measured as an individual.

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“Like Lando, I’m conflicted here. I managed a driver, at McLaren funnily enough, who was absolutely duped into handing over a race victory, not that this was the case on Sunday. I’ve also seen multiple champions who would have won the race and then handled the nuclear fallout afterwards, and who would have been secretly admired for that killer instinct in many quarters.

“The compliant team player on one of Lando’s shoulders won out over the selfish, competitive demon on his other.

“But McLaren has risen to be the team to beat on the grid these past few races because they’ve had a very strong team ethic and a calm, professional and methodical approach under the increasingly impressive Stella.

“They have frequently swopped the two drivers around in the past couple of seasons, and as they said to Lando on the radio, you’ll need all of us if you want to be champion.

“I wonder what Oscar would have done if the roles had been reversed. His manager Mark Webber was on the receiving end of the infamous Red Bull Multi-21 team orders in Malaysia 2013 when Sebastian Vettel ignored pre-race agreements and in-race instructions.

“What Lando should have done is let Oscar through immediately when requested, and then given himself the maximum opportunity to overtake, if he could, to take victory that way.”

Norris was able to trim Verstappen’s Drivers’ Championship lead to 76 points with that Hungary runner-up result.

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