McLaren reveal Norris-Piastri surprise after intense 2025 title battle: 'It was not a given'

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella has admitted harmony between drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri was "not a given" after the pair's tense battle for the 2025 F1 Drivers' title. However, despite Norris eventually beating his teammate to the championship, Stella has expressed his relief that the dynamic has seemingly even strengthened in 2026. For large parts of the 2025 season, Piastri had been in control at the top of the standings, 34 points ahead of Norris at Round 15 after a mechanical DNF for the Briton at Zandvoort, and 104 points ahead of Red Bull's Max Verstappen. A poor second half of the season from Piastri, including crashes in Baku and Austin, and McLaren strategy and set up blunders in Las Vegas and Qatar helped Norris, and miraculously Verstappen, get back into the championship. By season's end at Abu Dhabi, Piastri had finished P3, 11 points off Verstappen, and 13 behind world champion Norris. In 2026, McLaren have largely not been able to recreate their sensational form of the last two seasons - back-to-back Constructors' champions in 2024 and 2025 - although Norris did secure the Woking team's first win of the season at Budapest just prior to F1's summer break. It was a disastrous day for Piastri, however, leading the race before a collision with backmarker Carlos Sainz allowed Norris to get in front, before a DNF for the Aussie at the Hungaroring. Stella relieved over Norris-Piastri harmony after tough 2025 battle Photo: Race Pictures Photo: Race Pictures Reflecting on the first half of the season so far, McLaren boss Stella is nonetheless pleased Piastri has not let a frustrating end to the 2025 season affect his relationship with Norris in the current campaign, admitting that harmony between the two was not exactly certain. On Piastri and Norris' contributions so far in 2026, Stella began in a McLaren Q&A: "I am very pleased with how our driver line-up is performing in this early part of the 2026 season. For Oscar and Lando – as indeed for their twenty colleagues on the F1 grid – the impact of the new regulations has been nothing short of disruptive. "The new generation of single-seaters requires not only an adaptation of driving style but, above all, much greater focus on understanding how to exploit the full potential offered by the new power units. "The learning process has at times proved complicated and was slowed down, particularly in the early stages, by various reliability issues. Both have responded in the right way, working with great commitment alongside the team, day in, day out. There is still room for improvement, particularly regarding the power unit, and we are working very well with our partners at HPP, including on the interaction between the driver and the power unit." Focusing more closing on the relationship between Piastri and Norris, Stella said the dynamic between the title rivals has only improved, something which could have been expected from world champion Norris, but not as "predictable" from Piastri after a tough 2025 campaign. "Another aspect I’m really enjoying about our drivers is the way they’re working together," Stella said. "It wasn’t a given that, after last year – when they found themselves battling for the world title right up to the final race – the harmony they’d built would remain intact: yet not only has this not changed, but the relationship between them and with the team has actually become even stronger. "And whilst this might, in a sense, have been expected of Lando – given that he was ultimately the one to become champion – it was not quite so predictable for Oscar, who, instead, has relied even more heavily on the team to accelerate his development, both on and off the track."