A feisty Austrian Grand Prix is behind us with the entire F1 world seemingly pointing fingers in one direction for a certain incident on lap 63 at Spielberg.
And while there was definitely a large portion of blame easily put on one half of the parties involved in the incident, there is more to it than is being talked about.
Intrigued? Let’s get to it.
Verstappen-Norris incident has way more layers than is being talked about
Let’s start with the obvious. Max Verstappen was to blame for the incident in Austria with Lando Norris. He clearly moved over on the racing line, with the second collision being the far more dubious one than the first.
But let’s also bring up a few elephants in the room in regard to the incident.
The first being Norris’s attempt to pass Verstappen on the outside in the manner in which he did. As we had seen for several laps prior, Norris was a fan of the late lunge. But as we also saw numerous times, it never worked, with the McLaren driver forced to go off track into the run-off area which gained him an advantage and forced him to give the position back.
The day prior in the sprint we saw him make the move stick, but Verstappen was able to get him back at the next corner, with his teammate Oscar Piastri also able to send it past the vulnerable Brit due to his late move.
All this being said, there was absolutely no way Norris was making that move stick on the outside in the way he did, which is kind of ironic given Verstappen hitting him actually saved face for his attempted overtake failure.
Next, listening to Verstappen explain that he in fact always moved across into that area of the braking zone every lap was a point that not one person seemed to take on board. As Verstappen explained, he was the one in the car, he would know. Of course he is going to defend his move and not come out and admit he did it on purpose. But is the F1 media and world still so British-centric that we have to automatically assume that Norris was absolutely faultless and Verstappen was to blame?
Yes, that’s contradicting my initial point at pointing the blame at Verstappen. Because I genuinely believe he was at fault for the incident and warranted his ten-second penalty. But let’s take a few other moments to fully go over what we saw, rather than simply throw the book at one person.
All the greats have flaws, Verstappen proves that
The rhetoric to have come from the incident seems to imply that the crash between Verstappen and Norris signifies that Verstappen is back to his ‘old ways’ in hard racing and questionable tactics.
This of course is absolute baloney on many levels.
Firstly, Verstappen has never lost that side of him. No matter who races him, he always has the ability to race his rival hard and to the limit.
See only a few years ago in 2021 for that fact. The reason why it seems like this has ‘disappeared’ from his repertoire simply comes from the fact that he is usually so dominant that he doesn’t have to race anybody. So in some ways, it’s great to see this happen again given he is one of the very few breed of racers left who will take it this way to get to where he wants to be.
(Photo by Getty Images)
This brings me to my point of all the greats having these so-called ‘flaws’.
Ayrton Senna. Michael Schumacher. Fernando Alonso. Sebastian Vettel. They all have levels to their greatness that some have questioned. Perhaps too hard racing. Pushing it to the limit. Dangerous driving.
Flaws? Maybe. A sign of greatness? Absolutely.
There are only a handful of drivers who you can claim are perhaps ‘clean’ when it comes to their ultimate skill level and racing on track. Alain Prost. Lewis Hamilton. Jack Stewart. All incredible talents who have barely any stains on their legacy when it comes to their racing ability.
Does that make them better than the ones previously mentioned? No. It just shows that their flaws are somewhat different to the others.
What it does show, is that all the legends of the sport are flawed. And that, of course, includes Max Verstappen.
Norris needs to study Verstappen’s early years to get to where he wants to be
On the topic of Verstappen and those ‘old ways’, one important maturity level that Verstappen has reached is that of making very limited mistakes.
When he first started, he was always known as being quick but perhaps just not on the level of the other top drivers at the time as he was prone to many more mistakes alongside those hard racing skills.
Perhaps it’s time Lando Norris looked at those tapes to see just where he can improve?
Since his win in Miami, he arguably could’ve, and maybe should’ve, won three more races. And while circumstances for each of them were different as to why he ultimately didn’t win, there does have to be some debriefing going on within himself as to just why he hasn’t seen consistent success.
Is he as mistake-prone as Verstappen was? No. But is he at a mature level where he can constantly be challenging for wins and actually secure those wins? Perhaps not.
If Norris can sort that aspect out, then it won’t be long until the ‘what ifs’ turn into much more.
Piastri once again robbed of a win
Oh Oscar.
Another race where arguably we should be talking about a race win, it once again wasn’t the time to see a fifth Australian driver win a Formula One race.
This time around it came from a very questionable track limit violation on the Saturday, costing him third on the grid.
(Photo by Getty Images)
Had the team’s protest against the violation been successful and he had lined up third during the race, and assuming he would’ve been in that position still after the Norris and Verstappen incident, the race would’ve been his to win. Instead, he spent the race fighting his way up through the field and found himself too far behind eventual race winner George Russell to fully challenge him for the victory at the end.
His time will come. He will win a race. Let’s just hope he can get some luck his way soon to make that happen.
Why Perez should still be worried about his Red Bull seat in 2025
Since re-signing for Red Bull for 2025, Sergio Perez seemingly hasn’t even shown up to a race judging on his recent results.
In the three races since that announcement, he has had one DNF, an eighth and a seventh. In the three races prior to the announcement, he had another DNF, another eighth and a fourth.
To put just how bad he is doing into perspective, teammate Max Verstappen finished 17 seconds ahead of him on track in the race on Sunday, despite having a crash with Norris which caused damage to his car and forced him to pit, as well as being given a ten-second penalty. He also spent the closing laps battling with, and losing, to a Haas.
(Photo by Getty Images)
Given the rapid rise of McLaren and the fact Ferrari somehow keep scoring points, there is a real danger that Red Bull could lose out in the Constructors’ Championship this year if this form continues. And for a team that only lost one race last year and has still won seven of the eleven races this year, that simply isn’t good enough.
Perez needs to improve and fast otherwise the chances of Verstappen having a new teammate in 2025 will once again start to increase.
This article was originally written for The Roar. You can read the published version here
Comments