McLaren’s F1 drivers may prioritise “self-interest”, claims Horner

Red Bull boss Christian Horner has hinted that McLaren’s position in both Formula 1 world championships, with two drivers in the mix, will likely lead to ‘self-interest outweighing team interest’ – which could hurt the Woking squad.

Horner remarked on the two McLarens battling over second at the end of the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola, as Lando Norris pitted under a late-race safety car which brought him out behind team-mate Oscar Piastri.

McLaren let the pair race rather than call for Piastri to move aside, allowing Max Verstappen to maintain his lead at the front of the field and disappear out of sight once more.

Norris eventually dispatched his team-mate, but it was a close-run battle at Tamburello as Piastri defended the inside line into Turn 2; Horner praised both drivers for avoiding contact.

“Oscar had obviously pushed quite hard early on and you could see he was starting to get a little bit of graining on that front-right,” Horner said of McLaren’s race strategy.

“And so, it was borderline whether it was going to be a two-stop or one-stop. They obviously pulled the trigger on the two-stop, but it dropped you out because of the length of the pitlane here being 27 seconds.

“It put him into a world of pain traffic-wise. And so Max was then able to keep running and the deg was super low. And even with Lando in clean air behind, we were able to manage quite easily a nine-, nine-and-a-half-second gap.

“The VSC came out, and the pitstop was pretty straightforward. Oscar pitted again on his strategy, which sort of neutralised him, but by that time he’d used both of his hard tyres.

“And then that final safety car, obviously Max pitted, Lando pitted, but it dropped him behind Oscar, which was, you know, you’ve got two drivers that are fighting for a world championship.

“At some point, self-interest will always outweigh team interest. That’s the conflict. So, they did a good job to not make contact. It was commendable that they were allowed to race, but you could see it got pretty close.”

Horner believed that, on the day, Red Bull had the much stronger pace over the Imola race following the team’s steady build-up through the weekend.

He was encouraged by the team’s performance, particularly Verstappen’s blend of competitive lap times and management on the tyres.

“I think today we had the pace to cover whatever they could throw at us,” Horner added.

“I think the first stint was really encouraging because we could see that [Verstappen] was managing more than the guys behind. So, he was driving very smartly and still pulling out a gap.

“And that’s always a happy place to be in. So, you get the longevity. And it’s the first time in quite a while that we’ve been in that position.”