Lando Norris gives new insight into Hungary debrief after McLaren team orders drama

Lando Norris believes it is “crucial” that McLaren’s debrief into the Hungarian Grand Prix team orders drama was a “very quick process.”

McLaren claimed only their second one-two finish since 2010 at last month’s Hungarian Grand Prix as Oscar Piastri led home Norris , yet a shadow was cast over the Australian’s maiden F1 victory due to a mid-race team orders row.

Lando Norris opens up on McLaren team orders conversations

The pit wall went against standard protocol by pitting second-placed Norris first to protect the one-two result from third-placed Lewis Hamilton, with Norris’s early switch to new tyres undercutting him ahead of Piastri and into the lead.

Norris threatened to refuse the team’s requests to switch positions with Piastri over team radio during a tense sequence of laps, before finally slowing up and letting his team-mate by in the closing stages.

Norris went on to insist that he had always intended to return the lead to Piastri, yet went on to express regret that he did not do so earlier so he could attack his team-mate for the win on merit.

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Appearing on the Sky F1 podcast, Norris expressed his relief that the matter was cleared up quickly with conversations between McLaren chief executive Zak Brown, team principal Andrea Stella and his own management group.

Asked if the team sat to discuss it 24 hours after the race in Budapest, Norris said: “Honestly, it was a lot quicker than that.

“People made it into a much bigger thing, but it was a much quicker conversation between Andrea and myself, different people, Zak and myself, my management and myself.

“It wasn’t like it took days, it was pretty much a simple conversation and was understood from both sides.

“That was crucial, that it was not a long process. It was a very quick process. We’re able to do understand it, learn from it and move on.”

Brown, meanwhile, shed more light on the split responsibilities between himself and Stella, with the American putting his good relationships with Norris and Piastri to good use by having “very healthy” conversations with the drivers.

He explained: “Ultimately, Andrea is responsible for the performance of the racing team.

“I’m here to support Andrea, so the conversations are often: ‘What can I do to help? What do you need? What do you need me to work on?’

“I have great relationships with the drivers so that’s an area that I contribute to when we need to have conversations.

“The conversations are very healthy, they’re all team oriented. We make mistakes together, we have success together, we learn together.

“So in [the case of] something like Hungary, it’s just a bunch of conversations [along the lines] of: ‘What did we learn from that? What would we do differently next time?’

“At the end of the day, we finished first and second in the order which was earned and deserved.

“So it just added a little bit of drama. Maybe we were just trying to make it a little more exciting for the fans.”

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