Max said he didn’t feel the hit from Lando - would be interesting to know if that was true or stirring up trouble for McLaren, by suggesting that touch was inconsequential. It did seem like light contact & for sure in the race Oscar would not have known it preceded Lando coming across into him. Ultimately Lando’s actions led to contact with his teammate so if you take Ted’s statement of the rules as being “don’t hit each other”, then that logically leads to them being broken in this incident and the pre agreed remediation not being applied. There is maybe mitigation, that the contact with Oscar is a secondary effect, but I think maybe more important is the fact that the only reason Lando has gone deep and hit Verstappen is to attempt to pass Oscar i.e. so he’s made contact with his teammate whilst attempting (succeeding) in passing him. If you imagine he’d bounced off a kerb doing the same, I think we’d all expect McLaren to think that wasn’t on? We also have the context that Oscar has been warned off fighting Norris three times this year, despite not making contact with Norris once. Ultimately I think what we’re seeing here is that while McLaren and the drivers have discussed and accepted outcomes this far, I don’t think - especially in Oscar’s case, as he’s been the one losing out - they’ve all agreed on the outcomes. As such things are now starting to fester.
Lando's wing plate was damaged. It all boils down to this is racing, not a gentleman's club. Oscar has the advantage, he is in the lead. Lando would be much closer if he hadn't made that stupid move in Canada. I don't think any world champion can claim to be a gentleman when the lights go out. And yes, Verstappen knows how to wind his opponents up. The fight is on and we shall be entertained for once, hopefully.
I think this is the key point - McLaren have made it a gentleman’s club by overlaying their own private rules on top of the normal racing rules. Ted’s point is that they seem to be selectively applying them as he understands them. If they’d swapped the positions it would have been controversial, I’m glad they didn’t, but I’m equally unhappy they did intervene in Monza over the botched stop - I want to live in the world where it is just racing. Personally I don’t believe that McLaren are truly favouring Norris in the sense of actively doing things to try and ensure he wins, it’s more that the consequences of McLaren trying to do the right thing have universally favoured him (in 2025). If you’re viewing that from a balanced or pro-Oscar perspective, there’s an inevitable level of disquiet that the books won’t balance by the end of this year and that may prove decisive.
