🔗 Share this article

Amid the excitement surrounding the Sin City Grand Prix, Lando Norris is keeping a calm demeanor regarding his prospects of claiming his maiden drivers' championship.

The British driver currently has a 24-point lead over fellow McLaren driver Oscar Piastri and leads Max Verstappen by nearly fifty points, with only up to 83 points available across the remaining trio of races. But, after staging a remarkable recovery from 34 points behind his teammate following the Dutch Grand Prix in the summer, Norris is concentrating on executing with the clinical precision that lifted him to the lead of the standings.

"It can quickly turn in the other direction again even though I hope it doesn't," he commented. "That's racing, as we all know. Sometimes you get lucky. Other times you end up unfortunate. No matter what happens. There's really not worth becoming overjoyed or thinking about it. I still view it as something that's quite far away."

The 26-year-old has discovered his best form at a crucial moment—having struggled with the car in the first part of the season—at the same time that Piastri has lost the disciplined, almost flawless composure that had for so long made him seem to be a future title winner. Notably, Norris kept a remarkable level of composure throughout, asserting despite setbacks—like his withdrawal from the Zandvoort race—that he would stick to his gameplan and work each session with the identical relentless focus on specifics. This approach has paid off.

All the while, McLaren have worked hard to try to maintain a level playing field for their pair of racers, and it has on occasion been something of torturous experience, most notably at the Italian Grand Prix when the squad instructed Piastri to surrender second place to his teammate after he had fallen behind because of a slow pit stop. Some fans did not take well to what was considered the team needlessly interfering with their competitors.

Norris has claimed victory in the previous pair of grands prix, in Mexico and São Paulo, and was jeered on the podium at each, yet he remained unmoved. "When you're leading, many people want to bring you down. They don't want to see you winning. I consider it a positive sign," he remarked.

"It just makes me laugh. When I was on the winner's stage in Brazil, I truly loved it. The experience was very enjoyable. At last you feel like you're doing something right.

"It doesn't bother me, as long as I win. As long as I feel like I'm doing it the correct way, and I think that's the case, so long as I feel like I am dedicating effort into being who I am and those kinds of things, then I am not concerned with external opinions."

Vegas, meanwhile, must be mastered, and it is a circuit suited to the McLaren. It shares characteristics with Canada and Baku: low downforce, chilly conditions, and slippery surfaces. These are the only two tracks in the current championship where the papaya squad have failed to claim at least one top-three finish, and Norris was cautious again about their prospects in Nevada. Yet, his task in the immediate future is straightforward: end the race in front of his teammate and the championship tally he requires will follow.

Practice Shows Mixed Outcomes for Championship Contenders

The Ferrari driver led the leaderboard in FP1 on what was remained a sandy and extremely slippery surface. Alex Albon was runner-up, with the Red Bull star fourth, Norris in P6, and the Australian eighth. During the more indicative night running of second practice, the Briton was fastest ahead of the Silver Arrows of the Italian rookie, with Piastri 14th; however, the session lost almost all of the final 20 minutes of track time to check a suspected unsecured drain cover at the penultimate corner.

The issue is treated with caution on a temporary track where, at the inaugural Las Vegas GP staged in 2023, a dislodged manhole smashed into the Ferrari, severely harming it and leading to the practice to be aborted.

Mercedes Announce Stake Sale

The eight-time constructors' champions have confirmed that their boss Toto Wolff has divested a fifteen percent share in his holding company, representing a 5% share in the team, to American billionaire George Kurtz. Kurtz is the CEO and founder of the cybersecurity company the tech giant. Wolff will stay on as team principal and could earn as much as £230 million from the sale, with the Brackley-based outfit having been appraised at £4.57 billion, a new high for an Formula 1 constructor.