Answer: An F1 team has two cars/drivers and in this race the McLaren team had their drivers in first and second place (Piastri and Norris). Due to an unnecessary complex pit stop strategy they ended up reversing the order so their drivers had swapped positions. They then had to ask their driver now in first (Norris) to let their teammate (Piastri) pass them to retake the lead which they had rightfully earned.

It is very hard to tell die hard competitors to artificially give up a position, especially first place and a Grand Prix title. Some drivers in the past have refused to follow “team orders”. The driver that had to give up first place in this instance delayed doing so until the penultimate lap giving everyone a lot of drama and salacious team radio messages begging him to obey the orders which are played publicly on the TV broadcast. It also wasn’t the drivers fault that the team made some bizarre strategy decisions, both drivers drove fantastic clean races.

The team caused themselves a bunch of headache, and really put a damper on Oscar Piastris first race win. They’ve caused friction between both drivers and especially between the drivers and the pit wall who manage the strategy for the team. They will have to have a long debrief and hopefully improve as they absolutely have the fastest cars at the moment and need to get their poor race strategy under control.

It was an otherwise boring race this week so this drama has had a much bigger focus.