McLaren Points Finger at Competitors for Norris-Piastri Incident

McLaren F1 team executives Brown and Stella attributed opposing racers for the incident between Oscar Piastri and Norris at the start of the US GP sprint event.

Piastri, ahead of Norris in the standings by 22 points, made contact with his team-mate after hitting Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg.

The incident took both team drivers out of the race, along with the Alonso, who was on the inside of Hulkenberg.

McLaren Leaders Voice Frustration Over Incident

Zak Brown, the team's chief executive officer, told Sky Sports that some of the driving at the front was "inexperienced", remarking: "Obviously Hulkenberg made contact with Oscar and he had no business being where he was."

McLaren F1 team principal Andrea Stella commented: "The reaction is that we are disappointed that we didn't have the opportunity to race."

"It is unexpected that some racers with a lot of expertise fail to act with necessary care. Go to the initial turn, make sure you avoid harming other drivers and carry on."

McLaren clarified that the team principal was mentioning both the Sauber driver and Alonso.

Differing Perspectives on the Incident

Nevertheless, former champion Hill, commentating for BBC Radio 5 Sports Extra, said he thought the Australian had not shown enough understanding of the dangers of the opening turn of an F1 race when he decided to cut back to try to overtake Norris.

Piastri had a better start than Norris and at first competed on the outside on the uphill entry to the turn.

However he then moved inside in an effort to get a run on Norris on the exit, only to hit Hulkenberg.

Driver Reactions After the Incident

Piastri said: "Not ideal but I haven't seen what happened, I attempted to move inside on Norris and we were both quite distant from the corner apex and then were struck and it sent me into Norris. A shame."

His teammate said: "I just was struck, right? I was not at fault. Behind us things happened and I just got unlucky and was struck because of it. I don't know. I need to review a bit more thoroughly. It's more people further back just being a bit careless and we are the result of that."

The Aston Martin driver said: "At one point I believed I was in the correct position on the inner side, but some cars came very fast from the outer side switching back and then I was there in the middle."

Hulkenberg, who had qualified a best qualifying fourth place, said: "Big frustrations. All the strong performance from the previous day in the trash. Just messy."

"Piastri steered inward pretty forcefully trying to get the inside line and exit of Turn One but I cannot vanish."

"I had Fernando challenge on the inside and I couldn't see him any more. I aimed to leave space for him and then Piastri turned in and the contact was unavoidable."

Post-Crash and McLaren's Reaction

McLaren will review the crash with their racers but only after the race weekend. Both cars needed extensive work before qualifying session at 10 PM BST on Saturday.

The team principal said: "Overall displeased but we accept it, we are now focusing on fixing the vehicles, there is a lot to do and then we will resume the event from there."

"We are in a strong position from our competitiveness point of view so I trust we have the possibility to compete, compete fairly and utilize our capabilities."

"The points are the key thing, I don't want to talk about mal-intent, just prudence. A bit more care would be beneficial for everyone."

Standings Impact

The race was won by Red Bull's Max Verstappen, who gained ground on both team racers in the championship - he is now 55 points behind the Australian and thirty-three behind of the Briton.

Stella said: "The implication is what the numbers says - we missed out on eight points with both drivers, but we concentrate on ourselves. We have a very competitive vehicle and two skilled racers. We anticipate just some standard competition."

The Red Bull driver said he was taking the title race race by race.

US GP

17-19 October, with main event from 8 PM BST on the final day

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