Lando Norris Said He Defied Team Orders To Give His Teammate Oscar Piastri A Sprint Race Win

The Formula 1 Sprint Race in Qatar — part of the penultimate weekend of the 2024 season — had a completely unexpected ending as McLaren's Lando Norris eased off the gas just before the finish line to hand a victory to his teammate Oscar Piastri, something that he did for Norris a couple of weeks earlier in Brazil.

PIsastri gave Norris the win in hopes that he could help Norris challenge Red Bull's Max Verstappen for the World Drivers' Championship. While that didn't work out, McLaren still leads the Constructors' standings and a 1-2 finish will help that in a big way.

And that's probably why McLaren, didn't want Norris to fool around and hand Piastri the win,  even if it was courteous considering what had happened in Brazil.

"Just what I thought was best," Norris said, per the Formula 1 website. "It’s probably a little bit sketchy, the team told me not to do it but I thought I could get away with it and we did. Honestly, I don’t mind.

"I’m not here to win Sprint races, I’m here to win races and a championship, but that’s not gone to plan. I did the best we could and I look forward to tomorrow."

Norris alluded to it, but the Drivers' Championship has been decided, so now, it's all about the Constructors' Championship, where each place in the standings is worth millions and millions of dollars in prize money. McLaren is currently in an intense battle with Ferrari for the top spot.

So, while McLaren likely didn't care which of their drivers took the checkered flag, what surely made them nervous — and made the situation "Sketchy," as Norris put it — was that Mercedes George Russell was just a few tenths behind Piastri, as he was for practically the entire race.

If Norris had been careless in that handoff of the win, Russell could have easily passed him too as he eased off the gas, turning a 1-2 finish into a 1-3 finish. That's a problem as tight as the battle for the Constructors' title is, so McLaren's pitfall was certainly breathing a sigh of relief when it went off without a hitch.

Norris and Piastri will start alongside each other on the second row in P3 and P4 respectively, behind Verstappen in P2, who qualified on pole but received a one-place grid penalty for an incident with George Russell, with the Mercedes driver now starting on pole because of the penalty.

Crucially, both McLarens will start ahead of both Ferraris with Charles Leclerc in P5 and Carlos Sainz in P7.