Stella on McLaren driver management: We have to do some homework

Stella has one of the most desirable dilemmas a Formula 1 team boss may have to deal with: Two fast drivers and the best car on the grid.

This privileged situation does not come for free, as when your drivers are both fighting for the title, managing them and making sure they do not take each other out on track becomes a challenge.

The driver situation at McLaren came under the spotlight once again in qualifying for the Spanish Grand Prix as Oscar Piastri was finishing his first flying lap; his engineer warned him that Norris was just behind, starting his own lap, a subtle way to tell the Australian not to give his teammate a tow.

Piastri immediately moved to the side, breaking the tow, and commented over the radio: "Cheeky!"

Stella, facing the media in Barcelona, was asked about Piastri's comment and the state of the relationship between both his drivers. He responded: "It was a minor situation.

"We always tell our drivers like, ‘Don’t leave anything in the back of your mind, anything, throw it out, say what you think’. In this case I think that Oscar’s comment was to highlight a situation that we didn’t discuss before.

"In itself it’s not anything too controversial, but we sort of did not discuss that before, and we don’t want to surprise our drivers with situations that we didn’t discuss before, so a little bit to take on for the team rather than for the drivers.

"We have to do some homework and be ready even more for the coming races, which surely will be interesting," the Italian admitted.

McLaren have always insisted that Papaya rules govern the relationship between Piastri and Norris, which basically means the team's interests outweigh those of the drivers.

However, with the 2025 F1 constructors' title all but secured by McLaren, their drivers will not be pushing for their own interests.

But Stella insists managing the intra-team driver rivalry has not become any tougher; he added: "The briefing is not getting like tougher. The conversations are the same that we always have.

"Obviously when the two drivers start one next to each other and there is 800 metres to corner one, you might have to reiterate every detail of the way we go racing together.

"But so far I just can only be very grateful to Lando and Oscar, who have approached this internal competition with a great sense of responsibility and pretty much sticking to the letter to what are our racing principles and approach," he concluded.

While McLaren have a huge lead in the 2025 F1 constructors' standings—197 points ahead of second-placed Ferrari—the situation is quite different in the drivers' standings.

Piastri leads Norris by ten points, while Max Verstappen remains in contention in third place despite being 49 points off the lead with 15 races remaining. (Reporting by Agnes Carlier)