Why McLaren asked Piastri to move aside in Austin
McLaren’s early team order at the United States Grand Prix was a small moment with a clear strategic logic. Oscar Piastri let Lando Norris through, and team principal Andrea Stella has explained why the call made sense.
That matters because team orders can look like a simple preference for one driver over another. Here, the available details point to a decision made early in the race. The fragment doesn’t explain the circumstances behind the call, so its full strategic rationale remains unclear.
For anyone following McLaren’s handling of its drivers, the key question is what Stella saw in the race situation that justified the swap. His explanation is the focus of the article by Ben Vinel and Filip Cleeren, published on October 26, 2026.
Oscar Piastri, McLaren
Photo by: Kym Illman / Getty Images
The team order at Austin was a race decision grounded in pace, but it also carried a message after Singapore. McLaren wanted to give Lando Norris a shot at the cars ahead once it became clear Oscar Piastri couldn’t stay with them. That’s more significant than it looks: the team was asking its drivers to put McLaren’s immediate chances ahead of their internal contest.
Piastri and Norris had qualified on the fourth row at the Circuit of The Americas, behind Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari. The opening laps made the gap plain. Excluding the first lap, Piastri lost an average of 0.997 seconds per lap to leader Kimi Antonelli across the first seven laps. George Russell, despite struggling, was still gaining around two tenths per lap on him.
Norris said over team radio that he was “being held up.” McLaren told Piastri to move aside, and he let Norris through at Turn 1 on lap eight. Norris then opened a four-second gap over the next seven laps.
Team principal Andrea Stella said McLaren had already seen a pace difference during the weekend. Austin’s changing conditions, he argued, suited Norris’s adaptability, while Piastri’s strength is building a rhythm from consistent references. “This is a track in which Lando excels and is one of the tracks in which Oscar instead struggles a little bit more,” Stella said.
Lando Norris, McLaren, Oscar Piastri, McLaren, Andrea Stella, McLaren
Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images
Stella described Piastri’s “superpower” as building performance through repetition and familiar reference points. Austin offered little of that: every lap presented different conditions. Norris, by contrast, is particularly effective when the car is sliding and the grip keeps changing. The distinction explains McLaren’s call, though it doesn’t establish how much Norris might have gained without clear air.
The team had agreed before the race that Norris could try to attack the leaders if Piastri couldn’t keep pace with the cars in front. Stella said that was the situation McLaren saw on track. The order also followed a collision between the pair in the Singapore sprint. Stella said both drivers had renewed their focus on helping McLaren return to the front, with the longer-term aim of having Norris and Piastri qualify on the front row and fight for wins before the team manages their rivalry.
How Norris fought for the podium
Lando Norris, McLaren
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / LAT Images via Getty Images
McLaren’s one-stop gamble briefly put Norris in second place. Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, along with Max Verstappen, were committed to two stops; Norris held second until lap 46, when all three passed him. He still finished fifth after undercutting Isack Hadjar and George Russell. Piastri finished seventh, also ahead of Russell.
Stella said McLaren chose the hard tyre after practice suggested it could be competitive, while its rivals had selected softer compounds. The early stint offered some encouragement as those rivals struggled, and McLaren began to close the gap in the second stint. The team then stuck with one stop because a two-stop plan would likely have left Norris behind them. A safety car could have turned the gamble into an advantage, but none appeared.
Stella also joked that McLaren was still waiting for compensation for Madrid, where an untimely virtual safety car cost Norris a potential win. The reference points to the uncertainty at the heart of a one-stop strategy: it can create an opportunity, but only if the race supplies the right opening. Norris’s lost chance at Madring was still on his mind.
Lando Norris, McLaren
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / LAT Images via Getty Images
McLaren’s podium drought puts the upgrades in perspective
The strategy call had limited upside. Ferrari’s team principal said they tried to judge how much life remained in the hard tyres, while accepting that keeping Verstappen—and especially Leclerc—behind was unlikely. Hamilton’s position looked more attainable, depending on how long the tyres lasted. They chose to try, despite the uncertainty.
Ferrari was pleased with its strategy, tyre choices and the improvement it believes the upgrades have brought to the car. But those gains haven’t solved qualifying, and the team says it must keep developing if it wants to fight regularly for podiums, let alone wins. That’s the more revealing part: a better race car still needs a stronger starting position to turn progress into results.
McLaren’s recent run makes that challenge plain. It has gone four rounds without a podium, its longest such stretch since the final two races of 2023 and the opening two of its championship-winning 2024 season. The streak doesn’t explain the cause, but it shows how quickly a team’s recent form can shift.
Who slept worst last night: Lando Norris
