Lando Norris nearly found himself in a spot of bother in his pursuit of becoming Formula 1 world champion after he found himself under investigation for going off the track when aggressively overtaking Red Bull driver Yuki Tsunoda.
Tsunoda, driving defensively with Red Bull teammate Max Verstappen’s title hopes in mind, was overtaken on the outside by Norris with the help of DRS on lap 23.
In doing so, Norris appeared to leave the track, leading to two incidents being investigated: whether Norris left the track, and whether Tsunoda forced another driver off the track.
It resulted in Tsunoda being given a five-second time penalty for forcing another driver off the track, while Norris crucially avoided a penalty after the stewards looked at the incident.
“It was clearly the right decision,” said McLaren chief executive Zak Brown on Sky Sports. “That was a dangerous and unnecessary manoeuvre.
“This is a team sport, so I’m not surprised that the second car is going to help out, but I think there’s got to be a limit.
“But they (the team) are not driving the car so you’ve got to put that one on Yuki for, in my opinion, going over the line. It was a dangerous manoeuvre.
“But we’re all good now.”
Tsunoda was left confused by the penalty, saying: “Penalty, what penalty bro?”
Verstappen, who trails Norris by 12 points, started on pole after setting two laps in Q3 worthy of top spot on the leaderboard on Saturday, with the McLaren of Norris trailing by 0.201 seconds and having to settle for second.
Piastri started in third but managed to overtake Norris on the outside in the first lap, giving Verstappen a different McLaren car to contend with in his mirrors.
With Norris stuck dealing with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc while pushing for the front two, a decision was made for him to pit early, forcing him to work his way back up from eighth.
By the time he’d risen to fourth, Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate Tsunoda was in third, tasked with keeping the Briton out of the podium places.
Norris only needs a podium to claim his first title but if he drops to fourth or lower, a victory for Verstappen would seal his fifth consecutive championship and complete the most remarkable of comebacks from a 104-point deficit in the summer.
