'What they need to do' - Lando Norris weighs in on Mercedes battle he took advantage of

Lando Norris says that Mercedes drivers George Russell and Kimi Antonelli are doing “what they need to do” by fighting hard on track, given that the Formula 1 World Championship is at stake.

The fraught battle for the lead of the Montreal sprint between Russell and Antonelli had obvious echoes of that involving Norris and Piastri at McLaren last year, which came to a head when they made contact in the Canadian GP.

Norris had a grandstand view of the Mercedes fight, and he stole second place when Antonelli went wide and over the grass.

“The guys, they both pulled away a good amount, to be honest, in the beginning,” he said. “And I just couldn't go with them. I think we're clearly lacking a little bit of speed comparing to them, but the pace was still decent, especially then when I was a bit more behind George for the rest of the race.

“I just wanted to get to the chequered flag, honestly. I was obviously helped out by the fact that they were racing each other hard.

“And it was good to watch, just because sometimes it just is good to watch the racing part of it. And of course we capitalised on it, and that's what we're there to do.”

Asked if an intra-team battle at Mercedes could help McLaren to stay in the title fight Norris stressed that all he could do was optimise his own races.

"We're very early on in the season,” he said. “At the minute, I'm just trying to maximise every result that we can. Today was certainly one of those days where, in a way, we didn't deserve to be P2 but we were. Well, we deserved to be P2, we shouldn't have been P2, and were.

“So we'll see. It's just what you get, I think, when you have two good drivers fighting for a championship with a good team, that's what you expect. Each individual has to fight for their own career.

“You don't kind of just go out to prove your point every time, but because we signed up for it as an individual, you grow up alone wanting to be the best in the world, and every driver wants to do it, so they both have their own point to prove. They both want to go out and race, and at the minute they're fighting more than anyone for the World Championship.

“So, yeah, that's what they need to do. We'll be there. I think we're still lacking a bit at the minute, probably similar to last year from Max's position. So we'll see how much we can hang on for the time being. Obviously a day like today we maximised everything we could.”