Norris fights off Piastri for Austria win

Reuters

Andrew Benson

F1 Correspondent

29 June 2025, 15: 51 BST

245 Comments

15 minutes ago updated

Lando Norris won the Austrian Grand Prix after overcoming a McLaren team-mate’s long-range challenge.

Prior to the British Grand Prix next weekend, Norris’ third victory of the year, a McLaren one-two, reduced his championship deficit to 15 points, the Australians’.

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc took the final podium spot 17 seconds ahead of McLarens, with team-mate Lewis Hamilton finishing fourth, a further nine seconds behind.

After passing Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, who had split the McLarens in qualifying, at the corner, Piastri put pressure on Briton Norris in the opening session.

At the end of lap 10, Norris made errors in Turns Nine and 10 that gave Piastri a chance to run into him the rest of the way.

At Turn Three, Piastri briefly took the lead before Norris repassed at the following turn.

And Piastri made a late-dive down the inside of Turn Four on lap 20 before stuttering and avoiding hitting Norris’ car.

At the finish of that lap, Norris made his first stop. After three more laps, Pirastroi made his, and through the middle stint, Norris appeared to be in charge.

However, with 17 and 16 laps to go, Piastri started closing in once more after their final stops, which they made one after the other.

With 10 laps to go, Piastri, who had come out of his stop four seconds behind Norris, went on the radio to request assistance from his engineer, Will Joseph.

With six laps to go, Piastri was frightened by Alpine’s Franco Colapinto’s reversible turn, but he managed to maintain the pressure on Norris after being pushed onto the grass on the straight between Turns Three and Four. For the incident, the Argentine was given a five-second penalty.

Leclerc and Hamilton had a difficult race, finishing third and fourth overall for the entire grand prix, but Leclerc and Hamilton were in a lonely position as his engineer ignored him and called him anyway.

Russell was essentially the only racer to manage a one-stop strategy that worked in sixth and seventh places while Liam Lawson of Racing Bulls and Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin spent the majority of the race nose to tail.

Alonso and Lawson were within a second of each other for the entirety of their first practice session, and they soon rose again after making a stop one lap later. However, Alonso was reportedly a little quicker, but he was unable to move on the New Zealander.

Alonso was briefly passed at Turn Three with two laps left before the two-stopping Sauber of Gabriel Bortoleto, but the Spaniard used all of his experience to cut in and retake the position with the DRS overtaking aid going into Turn Four.

Alonso held on to lead the race in seventh place ahead of the Brazilian, who had already won his first points in Formula 1, after the McLarens came up ahead of them on the final lap.

Nico Hulkenberg of Sauber won the race for ninth place and Esteban Ocon of Haas won the championship.