Norris holds off Piastri for Hungarian GP win
Lando Norris held off McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri to win the Hungarian Grand Prix on a one-stop strategy and slash the Australian's Formula One lead to nine points going into the August break.
Norris completed 39 of the 70 laps on a single set of hard tyres while Piastri stopped twice and closed a 12-second gap to just 0.6 at the finish, with a nail-biting chase to the chequered flag and a near-collision.
George Russell took a distant third, 20 seconds down the road, to complete the Hungaroring podium for Mercedes and take his fifth podium of the season.
"I'm dead. I'm dead. It was tough," gasped Norris, who started in third place — with Piastri second — and then went down to fifth after being squeezed at the start. "We weren't really planning on the one-stop but after the first lap it was kind of our only option to get back into things.
"I didn't think it would get us the win, I thought it would get us maybe into second."
The win was Norris's fifth of the season, and third in the last four, to Piastri's six.
It was also McLaren's seventh one-two in 14 races. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc was a frustrated fourth, after starting on pole position but losing out with a two-stop strategy and a five-second penalty for erratic driving as Russell challenged.
Fernando Alonso finished fifth for Aston Martin, ahead of Sauber's sixth-placed Brazilian rookie Gabriel Bortoleto.
Lance Stroll was seventh for Aston Martin ahead of Racing Bulls' Liam Lawson, with Red Bull's reigning champion Max Verstappen and Mercedes rookie Kimi Antonelli completing the top 10 scoring positions.
Seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton, an eight-times winner in Hungary, started in 12th place for Ferrari and finished there. The Briton was lapped by the leaders six laps from the chequered flag.
F1 is healthier without Horner: McLaren boss
Formula One is a healthier place after the firing of Christian Horner as Red Bull team boss, McLaren chief executive Zak Brown said on Sunday.
Speaking to reporters after talks with Horner's successor Laurent Mekies at the Hungarian Grand Prix, the American welcomed the Frenchman's appointment and said his predecessor had crossed a line.
"I just left having a chat with Laurent, I'm happy he's in the role he's in," he said. "I like Laurent, and I think that'll be healthy, and maybe we can get back to focusing on competition on the track.
"There's always going to be some political aspects to the sport, I think it's going to be healthier with Laurent," he added. "I'm a fan of Laurent, I've known him for a long time and I think it'll be good to go racing against Laurent."
Brown and Horner were not friends, to put it mildly, and clashed frequently — with the former accusing Red Bull of cheating in 2022 when the team were found to be in breach of the 2021 cost cap.
The pair raced in British Formula Three and renewed their rivalry as bosses, trading barbs in the media with Horner a "pantomime villain" for audiences of the Netflix series 'Drive to Survive'.
McLaren dethroned Red Bull as constructors' champions last year — although Max Verstappen won the drivers' crown for Horner's team for the fourth time in a row — and have been dominant this season.
Brown said the Milton Keynes-based team, who dismissed Horner on July 9, had not seemed to be a healthy environment. Horner, who last year faced allegations of misconduct made by a female employee which he denied and was cleared of after an investigation, has not commented publicly on the reasons for his departure.
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