‘Huge McLaren blunder’ in Las Vegas, but was it necessary?

McLaren made a “huge blunder” in Las Vegas as Jos Verstappen says there was no need to push the set-up to the limit, if that’s what they did, given the Woking team’s advantage in the standings.

Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri finished second and fourth under the lights in Sin City, the teammates losing out to the fast-starting Max Verstappen, who capitalised on a mistake from Norris at Turn 1 to set up the victory.

Lando Norris lost 18 points and opened the door for Max Verstappen

McLaren’s celebrations over its double points haul was short-lived as the stewards announced that the cars were found to have exceeded the maximum plank wear allowed in race conditions.

The stewards revealed Norris had two measurements that were below the 9mm skid block limit as the front right skid block was 8.88m and his right rear was 8.93mm.

As for Piastri, he had three illegal measurements, as his front left was 8.96mm, the front right was 8.74mm and the right rear was 8.90mm.

Team principal Andrea Stella put it down to high levels of porpoising on the street circuit, explaining: “During the race, both cars experienced unexpected, high levels of porpoising not seen in the Practice sessions, which led to excessive contact with the ground.

“We apologise to Lando and Oscar for the loss of points today, at a critical time in their Championship campaigns after two strong performances from them all weekend.”

It was a huge blow to the McLaren teammates in the championship fight, and a “huge stroke of luck” for Verstappen.

Although the Red Bull won the race and narrowed his deficit to Norris and Piastri, he was 42 points down on the lead McLaren before the DSQ. He’s now 24 points behind the Briton on tied with Piastri on 336 points.

“The title race isn’t completely open yet, but it is a little more open. In any case, this is a huge stroke of luck for Max, that’s clear,” declared his father Jos to Formule1.nl.

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And McLaren has only itself to blame, says the former F1 racer.

“This is a big mistake by McLaren, a huge blunder, yes,” he said. “Because why would you really push it to the limit like that?

“Maybe it was really a mistake, but maybe the car just doesn’t work as well otherwise and they had to do it.”

He revealed Verstappen was already aware that the McLaren would be disqualified before he left the circuit.

“I spoke to Max briefly before he left,” said Jos. “He already knew then that they would be disqualified.”

The DSQ, though, wasn’t McLaren’s only mistake on the night.

Norris lined up on pole position ahead of Verstappen and made a huge – and costly – lunge across the track in an attempt to block the reigning World Champion.

But carrying too much speed into Turn 1, he lost the lead to Verstappen and also dropped behind George Russell to run third. It wasn not until lap 35 that Norris finally overtook the Mercedes driver to sit second behind Verstappen.

Told by McLaren “we want to go get Max”, Norris’ deficit was already over five seconds and it only grew from there as he finished 20s behind the race winner.

“That was too aggressive,” said the former Benetton driver. “It was a close call, and both cars could have collided, which would have taken them both out of the race.

“The problem is that Lando is only concerned with Max, Max, Max, but in the meantime, he simply forgets to brake for the first corner. Max braked at least five meters earlier. So you could call this a mistake too.

“And Zak Brown has often talked about Max’s driving style, saying he finds him too aggressive at the start, but I’m sure he’ll be talking to his own driver about this now.

“The pressure is now on McLaren, and they will feel it,” he continued. “It is still the case that if Max wins the remaining races and Norris finishes second every time, Norris will become world champion.

“But Oscar Piastri is also still in the running, and he won’t be very happy at the moment either.

“You can see a clear difference between the two McLarens on the track, how they go through the corners. One slides, the other doesn’t, and that raises questions.

“In any case, it’s going to be a hugely exciting end to the season, and for Max, everything has to fall into place. But he still has nothing to lose and can go all out on the attack. And that’s what he’ll do.”

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