Andrea Stella explained why McLaren refused Lando Norris’s request to make his second stop before Oscar Piastri during the Hungarian Grand Prix in Formula 1. According to the team principal, the decision followed McLaren’s internal racing principles and respected Piastri’s right to fight for the win after legitimately taking the lead.
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After the first round of pit stops, the 2025 champion was in second position, just behind his teammate, and asked over the radio to stop earlier. Engineer Will Joseph denied the request, and the team called the Australian to the pits on lap 33 to prevent Lewis Hamilton from taking the lead with an undercut.
Piastri returned to the track ahead of the Ferrari seven-time world champion, while the British McLaren driver stayed longer on the circuit. The competitor took advantage of the pace that, according to him, he could not exploit while following behind his teammate. His stop happened only at the end of lap 38, precisely when Oscar lost time encountering Carlos Sainz during an attempt to lap the Spanish driver. Norris returned to the track 0.7 seconds ahead of the Australian, quickly opened a gap, and won the race. Piastri, in turn, later retired with a gearbox problem.
After the race, Stella stated that McLaren prioritized the consistency of its competition philosophy. “You need to think about the best way to win the race and score the maximum points for the team, but there is also the need to be consistent with the way we race. Until Oscar’s stop, he had fairly taken the lead at Turn 2, so he deserved the opportunity to try to win,” he said.
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The manager acknowledged that Norris could have overtaken his teammate on other circuits but highlighted the characteristics of the Hungaroring. “On other tracks, Lando could probably overtake Oscar, but here it is very difficult. You need to have a very large pace advantage. That’s why we were happy to give Oscar the chance to fight for the win, preserving our racing principles.”
Stella also explained that the strategy was influenced by the threat posed by Hamilton. “When Hamilton stopped, he was in a position to undercut both McLaren cars. We needed to react because it was the right way to keep a McLaren in the lead of the race. It could have been Oscar or Lando, but Oscar was ahead and we understood that he was the car that should stop first.”
Finally, the team principal emphasized that the adopted strategy did not favor one driver over the other but was a consequence of the race scenario. “For Lando, this opened a different strategy. We did not change our plans thinking about Oscar or Lando. We did it because we needed to prevent Ferrari from taking the lead of the race,” he concluded.
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