Norris admitted that he drove like “a muppet” at the start
Lando Norris has questioned what he calls a “rushed decision” by the FIA stewards that cost him third place in the US GP.
Norris was penalised five seconds for gaining an advantage by going off track while attempting to pass Max Verstappen in the closing laps.
He didn’t quite open a big enough gap to cancel out the penalty, so the positions were reversed after the flag.
Calls on such penalties are routinely made without speaking to the drivers concerned, and when a podium position is at stake and an incident happens in the late stages there is obviously an urgency to produce a quick outcome.
In this case it had a significant impact on the World Championship, creating a six-point swing in Verstappen’s favour.
“It’s a tough job to steward these kinds of things,” said Norris. “For me, whatever I did, the point that is incorrect is what Max did, which is also defend his position by going off the track, and what effectively would be keeping his position, which is not correct.
“He went off the track by defending, and he’s overdefended and made a mistake, and therefore he’s gained. The same time, because of that, I’ve had to go off the track.
“It’s impossible for people to know if I could have made it on the track or couldn’t. Therefore you cannot steward that kind of thing. But those are the rules.
“They seem to change, because I feel like it’s quite inconsistent from say, what happened in Austria, where Max didn’t get a penalty and went off the track gained an advantage. So I think there’s again inconsistency.”
Norris suggested that in such instances the views of the drivers should be heard.
“For me it’s just a rushed decision, and they don’t hear or understand our points, which they should do after the race,” he said. “They just want to make a decision at the time, so you don’t alter points and podiums and things like that.
“But therefore it’s a rushed decision, and they don’t hear my point of discussion, or my team’s point or Max’s point, which I don’t think is maybe the most correct thing. But today it was a penalty, and not a lot I can do apart from just accept that I tried.
Expanding on the theme he said: “They’re just guessing. I don’t think that’s how stewarding should be done. It’s a difficult job for them to do.
“So not complaining against them. I think it’s just more the fact they don’t see everything, understand everything as well as we do when we’re inside the car.”
Norris and Verstappen had another close moment at the start of the race, when both went wide and Charles Leclerc was able to steal the lead.
“I think both times Max went off the track, he had a lot of commitment to keep me behind,” said Norris. “Thing is, with Max, you’ve got to commit. People don’t understand that kind of thing. With Max, you can’t just go half hearted.
“Turn 1 is a bit harder to say whether it was because I didn’t commit enough, but the fact that he committed so much speed in that he again went off the track.
“I can’t just dive up the inside of someone, run off and then keep the position in normal running, but for some reason it’s completely okay on lap one in Turn 1.”
Norris stressed that both drivers in the fight are competing in a high stakes environment.
“I think Max drove very well,” he said. “I think it’s very hard to do what we’re doing, and it’s hard when you’re side-by-side, you’re completely on inside of the track, to guess what your braking marker is.
“You’re going quicker than you have before because you use the battery, the tyres are older, there’s different bumps, there’s a lot of dirt. We’re battling and we’re fighting hard.
“So I respect the battle that we had. It was a good one. It was enjoyable. I think it was respectful. I think turn one I didn’t do the correct thing. But I feel like what happened in the end of the race was more on my side.
“Otherwise, it was a good battle, and I enjoyed it. We just didn’t come out on top because I didn’t do a good enough job.
“If I defended better in turn one and wasn’t driving like a muppet, I’d have led after turn one, and we shouldn’t have this conversation in the first place.”
Regarding the impact on his championship challenge he said: “It’s a momentum killer, but we came in here with our mind open, not expecting to dominate or just win or anything. So the fact that Ferrari was so quick today showed they’re just as competitive.
“Even if I came around turn one in first I would never have finished first or second, and only could have finished third.
“But the one guy I need to beat is Max, and that’s the guy I didn’t beat today. So it was a non-successful weekend all in all, but we gave it a good shot. I tried. It wasn’t good enough, and we have work to do, and I have work to do it myself.”
Adam Cooper F1 