PA Media/DPA
Baku
Lando Norris says he does not want to be gifted a world championship but is grateful to McLaren and team-mate Oscar Piastri for agreeing to favour him over the remainder of his title pursuit.
The British driver has cut Max Verstappen’s lead by 16 points over the last two races and arrives in Baku this weekend 62 points adrift of the three-time world champion.
But Norris finished only third behind team-mate Piastri, in second, at Monza a fortnight ago after the Australian’s opportunistic opening-lap move at turn four resulted in Norris dropping from first to third.
The pair have confirmed that an agreement has been reached to favour Norris in his pursuit of Verstappen but the 24-year-old does not want to be handed victories by his team-mate.
"No (he won’t be giving me wins),” Norris said.
"Second and third (as in Monza) would probably be switched around. In general he will be helping me probably for lower positions. But if he has fought for a win and is deserving of a win then he deserves to win.
"I don’t want to be given a championship. Yes, it would be nice to have a championship and short term it would feel amazing. I don’t think you would be proud of that in the long run.
"That is not how I want to win it, I want to win it by fighting Max, beating Max and my competitors and being the best driver on track.”
Norris says the debate around Piastri’s move in Monza has been "resolved” and, while the particulars of the new agreement to lean towards the British driver are still being ironed out, he says the team still do not have a number one driver.
"There will be certain times where it is not smart to battle. You have to go into lap one with the right approach which is to go forwards,” Norris said.
"Monza was a different case and we have resolved that.
"Things have been clarified and cleared up. We came out of turn one (in Monza) first and third and we had a big gap going into the corner.
"That’s not how we should have gone racing there. There are clearer instructions on how we can race each other. That has been cleared up.
"We are not classing it as number one and two and I don’t think we ever will. But in terms of our process there is a bias towards helping me.”
Australian Piastri, in his second season in Formula One, is happy with the agreement.
"It still needs some more discussion (about changing places) but the main point is it’s not me going to be pulling over for Lando every single race because none of us, including Lando, wants to go racing in that way,” Piastri said.
"Selfishly as a driver I have my own interests and team orders are not that fun. But in saying that I realise there is a big bigger picture here than just myself.
"It’s not just about me and I am happy to play a supporting role at this point of the season.”
Verstappen claimed after Monza that his hopes of winning a fourth straight title were now "not realistic” despite his sizeable lead.
Norris dismissed that, saying: "That is just Max saying what he wants. He is still leading by 60-odd points.
"I have eight races to catch 60-something points and it is not easy to do that even if I win every race. He is the one in a better position. I would rather be in his position than my position.”
Verstappen is on a run of six races without a win and admits Red Bull are still working to understand their issues.
"We still have a lot of work to do but in a way Monza was positive to learn about the car,” Verstappen said.
"Now it is about trying to find solutions, it is not coming in one or two races. I hope that from now onwards we can look ahead and try to be better.”