How McLaren placated Piastri and persuaded Norris on the radio · RaceFans

The final stint of the Hungarian Grand Prix provided one of the most remarkable examples of a team convincing its driver to give up a victory to his team mate.

Teams have issued similar orders many times in past races, and not just McLaren. What made this occasion unusual was that McLaren didn’t simply bark out an order, but coaxed Lando Norris for lap and after until he finally gave way.

Once he did, Norris remarked “you don’t need to say anything”. By that point his race engineer Will Joseph had said so much it was hard to imagine more ways he might have twisted his driver’s arm.

McLaren faced the dilemma because Norris jumped ahead of his team mate Oscar Piastri through the final round of pit stops. Piastri led from the start until then, and although McLaren pitted Norris before his team mate the first time around the drivers remained in their original order that time.

Norris might have been forgiven for assuming McLaren intended to move him ahead by pitting him first during their initial pit stops, as that is exactly what they did in the same race 12 months early. But this time they made it clear to him that was not the plan:

After a long middle stint, McLaren prepared to bring their drivers in for their final stops. As was the case the first time around, they were concerned about the threat from Lewis Hamilton behind and chose to bring Norris in before Piastri:

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Again, McLaren made it clear to both drivers they were not giving Norris the benefit of an early pit stop in order for him to overtake Piastri. However, on this occasion, Norris did come out ahead.

Norris did not immediately give the position up. McLaren became concerned about how hard he was pushing his tyres so early in the stint and issued a series of warnings. When he didn’t respond to these, Joseph checked his radio was working.

Eventually Norris backed his pace off by half a second. Joseph appeared to draw the conclusion he was slowing down to let Piastri through, and thanked him.

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But Norris picked up the pace, dipping below the 1’22s again, pulling out more of a lead on Piastri. Now McLaren grew concerned and urged him to hand over the lead. When he didn’t, Joseph repeated their worries about the strain he was dishing out to his tyres.

While McLaren were urging Norris to comply with their order, they also had to stay on top of routine business, such as checking whether he wanted to pit if the Safety Car was deployed. Eventually, Joseph progressed from warning Norris about his tyres to advising him not to risk the harmony within the team by refusing to give up the lead.

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By now Piastri was over five seconds behind and beginning to wonder why Norris hadn’t handed the lead back to him.

The argument at the other car had progressed to the stage that Norris was reminding Joseph he was McLaren’s best-placed driver to beat Max Verstappen in the championship. Joseph urged his driver to see that giving up the lead represented his best chance in his title fight in the long-term.

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Still the laps ticked down, still Joseph employed every rhetorical device he could think of and still Piastri kept the pressure up. His race engineer Tom Stallard told him they were “managing” the situation, but at this stage they still had no inkling Norris was about to back down.

After the race Norris claimed it was this message from Joseph, pointing out a late Safety Car would make it impossible to reverse the positions, which prompted him to back off. Finally, with two laps to go, he gave up the lead.

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Piastri’s celebrations after the chequered flag were on the muted side, though as Stallard observed that is in-keeping with his reserved nature. The race winner apologised for making the position swap “a little bit more painful than it needed to be” by not being on Norris’ pace.

Norris took longer to come on the radio after taking the chequered flag in second place, but when he did, he offered his congratulations to his victorious team mate.