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Despite all hype surrounding the Las Vegas Grand Prix, McLaren's lead driver is keeping a calm demeanor regarding his chances of claiming his maiden drivers' championship.

Norris presently holds a 24-point lead over teammate Oscar Piastri and leads Max Verstappen by nearly fifty points, with only a maximum of 83 points available across the final three events. But, after staging a remarkable recovery from a significant deficit his teammate after the Dutch Grand Prix in August, Norris is concentrating on executing with the clinical precision that propelled him to the top of the championship.

"Things can easily turn in the other direction once more even though I hope it doesn't," he commented. "That's motorsport, as we all know. You can also have luck. You can also be unlucky. No matter what happens. There's really no point becoming overjoyed or thinking about it. I continue to do see it as something that's quite distant."

The 26-year-old has found his peak performance at a critical juncture—having struggled with the car in the first part of the season—while his teammate has lost the disciplined, nearly perfect composure that had for so long made him appear to be a future title winner. Notably, Norris kept a remarkable level of composure throughout, asserting despite setbacks—like his withdrawal from the Dutch GP—that he would adhere to his strategy and approach each session with the same relentless attention to detail. This approach has paid off.

Meanwhile, McLaren have worked hard to try to maintain a level playing field for their pair of racers, and it has on occasion been a rather torturous experience, especially at Monza when the team instructed the Australian to surrender second place to his teammate after he had fallen behind because of a slow pit stop. Some fans were unhappy with what was considered McLaren unnecessarily interfering with their competitors.

Norris has won the last two grands prix, in Mexico and São Paulo, and was jeered on the podium at both, leaving him unmoved. "When you're on top, many individuals try to bring you down. They don't like seeing you succeeding. I see it as a positive sign," he said.

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

"It doesn't bother me, provided that I win. As long as I believe I'm doing it the right manner, which I feel like that's the case, as long as I am confident I'm putting effort into being who I am and those kinds of things, then I'm not too fussed about the rest of it."

Vegas, on the other hand, must be mastered, and it is a circuit ideal for the McLaren. It shares similarities with Montreal and Baku: minimal aerodynamic grip, cool temperatures, and slippery surfaces. These are the only two tracks in the current championship where McLaren have failed to secure a single top-three finish, and Norris was cautious again about their prospects in Nevada. Still, his objective in the short term is simple: finish in ahead of his teammate and the points he requires will come.

Practice Sees Mixed Outcomes for Championship Contenders

Charles Leclerc topped the times in FP1 on what was still a dusty and extremely slippery surface. The Williams racer was second, with Verstappen fourth, the McLaren ace in P6, and the Australian in eighth. During the more indicative night running of FP2, the Briton was quickest ahead of the Silver Arrows of the Italian rookie, with Piastri down in fourteenth; though, the session was interrupted for almost all of the final 20 minutes of track time to check a reported loose drain cover at the penultimate corner.

The issue is taken seriously on a street circuit where, at the first Nevada GP staged in 2023, a loose drain cover struck the Ferrari, severely harming it and leading to the session to be aborted.

Mercedes Confirm Ownership Transaction

Mercedes have confirmed that their boss Toto Wolff has divested a 15% stake in his investment firm, representing a five percent ownership in the squad, to American billionaire the cybersecurity magnate. Kurtz is the chief executive and creator of the digital protection firm the tech giant. Wolff will remain as boss and could earn as much as £230 million from the deal, with Mercedes having been appraised at £4.57 billion, a record for an F1 team.