McLaren has denied that Lando Norris could’ve won the Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix had the team imposed an earlier swap between him and Oscar Piastri.
The Woking-based squad’s three-race unbeaten run was curtailed as the European season began as Verstappen beat Norris and Piastri to prevail once more at Imola.
Verstappen was in utter control until Andrea Kimi Antonelli stopped his Mercedes with 17 laps to go, triggering a Safety Car that eliminated his substantial advantage.
But with Piastri having pitted twice at that point, Norris emerged as the likeliest McLaren to threaten Verstappen as he switched to new Hards along with the Red Bull.
However, Norris’ stop dropped him behind Piastri and the two remained in that order on the restart, despite the Briton highlighting that he had a greater chance to win.
Norris capitalised on the fresher tyres to complete a pass on Piastri around the outside at Tamburello, but it materialised too late to mount a challenge to Verstappen.
McLaren boss Andrea Stella, though, has explained how Red Bull’s “surprising” pace in race trim ensured that Norris didn’t possess the required delta to make a move.
“I think today we attempted to unlock various scenarios to try and beat Max, but at no stage I think we saw that we had enough race pace,” Stella told media including Motorsport Week.
“Even when, with the final Safety Car, Lando could pass Oscar and try to push as much as possible, pretty much Max was responding to Lando.
“So here to overtake you need seven, eight tenths of a second, so I think it’s what it is. The main factor remains the swap of position and the outcome of lap one.”
Why McLaren elected to pit Norris
Stella revealed that Norris supported the choice to cede track position to make a pit stop, citing that Charles Leclerc’s struggles on worn tyres vindicated the decision.
“We discussed these kind of scenarios before the race, so we don’t enter the race with everything to be debated live,” he elaborated.
“And we know that when you have degradation, you need the new tyres and you need to stay out on new tyres even if Imola is not the easiest track to overtake.
“Not only you can be re-overtaken by those that pitted, but you can be overtaken multiple times, which I think is what happened today with Leclerc.
“So I think with Oscar we were happy to take a bit of risk because we know that the car is competitive and we knew that the tyres were not going off completely and Oscar wanted to play this car to try and see if he could gain a position.
“Fair enough, the drivers are free to race from his point of view.
“But Lando was quite convinced that he wanted the new tyres because he would have been able to re-overtake.
“And again, if we wanted to have a chance with Max, we did need the new tyres. So I think it was a relatively straightforward decision.”
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