Lando Norris offers hilarious response to F1 title concern question

Lando Norris cooly brushed off suggestions he is concerned about McLaren favouring Oscar Piastri in the F1 title race amid the threat posed by Max Verstappen.

Back-to-back victories for Verstappen have seen the four-time world champion reduce leader Piastri’s advantage down to 69 points, while he is 44 points behind Norris with seven races and three sprints still remaining this season.

Piastri’s retirement at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, coupled with Norris’s lowly run to seventh and Red Bull's revival, have sparked suggestions that McLaren may need to prioritise one of their drivers in the run-in.

McLaren have so far given both Piastri and Norris equal treatment and do not plan to change their approach, despite considering Verstappen a championship contender.

Norris, who is 25 points behind Piastri in the title race, was asked ahead of this weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix if he is concerned his teammate could be prioritised over him, to which he quipped: “I’m very concerned. Very worried about it and scared frankly. I am happy you asked that. No.”

Norris sees Verstappen as a ‘genuine challenger’

Joking aside, Norris believes Verstappen is a “genuine” challenger for the 2025 F1 world championship.

“He is genuinely a challenger,” Norris insisted. “If you go back to the beginning of the season they were challenging us for the first six or seven races for wins, then we brought some upgrades and improved a little bit.

“But then they brought a couple of upgrades and that has put them on the same level. We are still expecting to dominate and we come to these races with the goal and ambition of winning and wanting to dominate and continue the form we have shown all season.

“But in Baku we had the car to win and we didn’t. We had the chance to fight Max. At the round before in Monza they were too quick for us. And if there are some races coming up where he is too fast, which is very possible, because I expect them to be quick for many of the races this season…

“We will go to Las Vegas and other low-downforce tracks where we don’t expect to be as great as we have been - so that is an opportunity for Red Bull - but we are just focusing on ourselves and maximising our performances.”

But Norris would not go as far as to rate Verstappen’s chances in percentage terms.

“I mean there’s a chance, so more than zero!” Norris said. “There’s probably like actual stats. I don’t know! There’s a chance.”