McLaren Boss Explains Divisive ‘Papaya Rules’ Team Orders at F1 Italian GP

McLaren made a controversial decision at the Italian Grand Prix, swapping Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri’s positions at the end of the race.

In the latter stages of the race, Oscar Piastri came in for a pit stop first, executing an undercut while Lando Norris stayed out.

When the British driver came in for his pit stop, he ended up suffering from a slow 5.9 second stop.

After running in second place for most of the race, Norris was now in third, behind Piastri.

Then, Piastri was ordered to switch places, giving Norris back his P2 spot.

“This is a bit like Hungary last year; we pitted in this order for team reasons,” Piastri’s race engineer, Tom Stallard, said on the radio. “Please let Lando pass, and then you’re free to race.”

Piastri entered Sunday with a 34-point lead in the championship, ahead of Norris, which made the decision all the more controversial.

“I mean, we said that a slow pit stop was part of racing,” Piastri replied on the radio.

“I don’t really get what’s changed here, but if you really want to do it, I’ll do it.”

If they held positions rather than swap, his lead would grow to 37 points. Instead, it was reduced to 31 points.

McLaren’s “Papaya Rules” have long been divisive. Team principal Andrea Stella explained the team’s decision regarding the orders sent to Piastri.

“I think that the pit stop situation is not only a matter of fairness, it’s a matter of consistency with our principles,” Stella said.

“And wherever the championship goes, what’s important is that the championship runs within the principles and the racing values that we have at McLaren and that we have created together with our drivers.

“The situation whereby we swap the drivers is not only related to the pit stop, and this is a big useful that I clarify, it’s also related to the fact that we wanted to sequence the pit stop of the two cars by stopping Oscar first and then Lando.

“It was just done because we were covering Leclerc, and at the same time, we were waiting until the last possible moment to see if there had been a red flag or a safety car.

“So we pursued the team interest, and to capitalize as much as possible on this interest, we needed to go first with Oscar, then with Lando, but the clear intent was this is not going to deliver a swap of positions.

“So the fact that we went first with Oscar, compounded by the slow pit stop of Lando, then led to a swap of positions, and we thought it was absolutely the right thing to go back to the situation pre-existing the pit stop and then let the guys race.”