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Amid all excitement around the Las Vegas Grand Prix, McLaren's lead driver is maintaining a level head regarding his prospects of securing his first drivers' championship.

The British driver currently has a two-dozen point lead over teammate Oscar Piastri and is ahead of Max Verstappen by 49 points, with just up to eighty-three points up for grabs across the final three races. However, after pulling off a extraordinary comeback from 34 points behind his teammate after the Dutch Grand Prix in the summer, Norris is concentrating on executing with the methodical approach that lifted him to the lead of the standings.

"It can quickly turn in the other direction again as much as I don't want it to," he stated. "That's motorsport, you know. You can also have luck. Other times you end up unlucky. No matter what happens. There's really no point getting excited or dwelling on it. I continue to view it as something that's quite distant."

The 26-year-old has discovered his best form at a crucial moment—having struggled with the car in the opening half of the season—while Piastri has shed the controlled, almost perfect composure that had for so long made him seem to be a future title winner. Importantly, Norris kept a impressive level of equanimity all along, asserting despite setbacks—such as his retirement from the Zandvoort race—that he would adhere to his gameplan and approach each session with the same unwavering focus on specifics. This approach has yielded results.

All the while, McLaren have gone to no little effort to attempt to preserve a level playing field for their two drivers, and it has on occasion been something of torturous process, most notably at Monza when the team directed Piastri to surrender second place to Norris following he had fallen behind due to a slow pit stop. Certain spectators did not take well to what was considered the team needlessly manipulating their competitors.

The championship leader has claimed victory in the last two grands prix, in Mexico and São Paulo, and was jeered on the podium at each, leaving him unfazed. "Once you are leading, many people want to bring you down. They don't want to see you succeeding. I consider it a positive sign," he remarked.

"It makes me laugh. While standing on the winner's stage in Brazil, I truly loved it. It was very satisfying. At last you sense that you are achieving something right.

"It doesn't bother me, as long as I win. As long as I feel like I'm doing it the correct manner, and I think I am, as long as I feel like I'm putting hard work into remaining true to myself and similar principles, then I'm not too fussed with external opinions."

Las Vegas, on the other hand, needs to be mastered, and it is not a track suited to the British team. It shares similarities with Montreal and Baku: minimal aerodynamic grip, chilly conditions, and slippery surfaces. They are the only two circuits this season where McLaren have been unable to claim at least one podium place, and Norris was circumspect once more about their prospects this weekend. Still, his objective in the short term is straightforward: finish in ahead of his teammate and the championship tally he requires will come.

Practice Sees Mixed Results for Title Contenders

The Ferrari driver topped the leaderboard in FP1 on what was still a dusty and extremely slippery surface. The Williams racer was second, with Verstappen in fourth, Norris sixth, and Piastri eighth. During the more representative evening session of FP2, Norris was quickest ahead of the Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli, with his teammate down in fourteenth; however, the session was interrupted for almost all of the final 20 minutes of running to inspect a reported loose drain cover at turn 17.

This problem is taken seriously on a street circuit where, at the first Nevada GP held in 2023, a loose manhole smashed into Carlos Sainz's Ferrari, severely damaging it and leading to the practice to be ended.

The German Team Announce Stake Sale

The eight-time constructors' champions have confirmed that their boss the Austrian executive has sold a 15% stake in his investment firm, equating to a five percent ownership in the squad, to US tycoon George Kurtz. Kurtz is the CEO and founder of the cybersecurity company the tech giant. Wolff will remain as team principal and could earn up to £230m from the deal, with Mercedes having been appraised at £4.57bn, a record for an Formula 1 constructor.