McLaren increasingly look set to have an intra-team battle between Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris to lift the 2025 F1 drivers’ title on their hands for the rest of the season.

Only eight points now separate the papaya pals atop the F1 drivers’ championship after the first 12 of the 24 rounds due to be staged this term. Piastri and Norris have even opened 69 and 61-point leads over Max Verstappen, as the Red Bull racer targets his fifth title in a row.

Verstappen can become only the second driver in F1 history after Michael Schumacher from 2000 to 2004 to win the championship in five consecutive campaigns. But the Red Bull RB21 has struggled to pose a persistent threat to the McLaren MCL39 over the first half of 2025.

Red Bull motorsport adviser Helmut Marko believes Verstappen’s 2025 title hopes are ‘over’ after falling almost three full Grand Prix wins behind Piastri in the standings. The Dutchman now needs to outscore the Australian by 5.75 points per round to retain his crown this term.

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Oscar Piastri finds fighting Lando Norris for the F1 title ‘easier’ as they share data at McLaren

Piastri is relishing the prospect of McLaren having an in-house fight to secure the team’s first drivers’ title since Lewis Hamilton in 2008. The 24-year-old believes it is ‘easier’ to manage a title fight when going up against a teammate, as it allows him to look at his direct rival’s data.

Norris, naturally, can also observe Piastri’s data, which is one negative from McLaren having the two favourites to win the drivers’ title. Although their data is not absolutely comparable, as Piastri refuses to use McLaren’s modified front suspension geometry that Norris relished.

“In some ways, it makes it easier because you can see what your opponent’s doing,” Piastri told RACER. “You know what they’re doing with the car [and] you know how they’re driving the car, so you have a lot more insight in some ways.

“But it also makes it more difficult because that obviously goes the other way as well. I think the other thing that makes it difficult is, obviously, when it comes to races and strategy.

“Obviously, only one of you can pit at a time, or both of you can pit at the same time, but one of you is going to lose a lot. So, that’s another element that becomes difficult to manage for the team, more so than the drivers.

“But there’s positives and negatives of having that battle within the same team. I think we do a very good job of managing it because we’ve seen in the past [that] it can be a pretty difficult situation to manage.”

Oscar Piastri beat his teammate to win the F3 and F2 titles in his rookie seasons

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Piastri can turn to Mark Webber for help amid his F1 title fight with Norris, too, as the nine-time Grand Prix winner and fellow Australian is the McLaren pilot’s agent. Norris is also not the first teammate with whom Piastri fought to win a title through his single-seater career.

Melbourne native Piastri won the 2020 Formula 3 title as a rookie when he beat ART Grand Prix’s Theo Pourchaire by three points and PREMA partner Logan Sargeant by four. He even beat PREMA teammate Robert Shwartzman by 60.5 points for the 2021 F2 title as a rookie.

McLaren not having a car to compete for the crown ensured Piastri could not win the F1 title as a rookie in 2023. But he now has a package that is propelling the seven-time Grand Prix winner to the top of the table in a close battle with teammate Norris in the 2025 F1 season.

Piastri’s F3 title was not the only close fight that he ultimately conquered, either. He sealed his first single-seater title in Formula Renault Eurocup in 2019 when he beat now-Williams junior Victor Martins by 7.5 points. Now, Piastri has his eyes on denying Norris the F1 title.