{"id":36119,"date":"2025-08-28T17:58:59","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T17:58:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/tricky-to-be-friends-with-mclaren-f1-team-mate-oscar-piastri\/"},"modified":"2025-08-28T17:58:59","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T17:58:59","slug":"tricky-to-be-friends-with-mclaren-f1-team-mate-oscar-piastri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/tricky-to-be-friends-with-mclaren-f1-team-mate-oscar-piastri\/","title":{"rendered":"Tricky to be friends with Mclaren F1 team-mate Oscar Piastri"},"content":{"rendered":"


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‘It’s tricky’ – Norris on being friends with competitor Piastri<\/figcaption><\/p>\n
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F1 driver Lando Norris says it’s “tricky, but certainly not impossible” to be friends with McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri.<\/p>\n

The pair are in a close battle for the drivers’ championship, with Norris trailing by nine points ahead of the Dutch Grand Prix this weekend.<\/p>\n

“It’s very difficult to have a combination of knowing deep down you really want to beat that person more than anything, but also have a very good working friendship,” Norris tells BBC Newsbeat.<\/p>\n

“I work so closely with him that [we’re] naturally inclined to be good friends, but I also want that.” <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Earlier this month, McLaren Formula 1 boss Zak Brown said the pair will “not properly fall out”<\/a> as their title fight comes to a head.<\/p>\n

But Brown said he expects the pair to “swap paint again at some point” after Norris ran into the back of Piastri in Canada in June.<\/p>\n

“I want to get along with the people that I work with,” insists Norris: “I want to have a laugh and enjoy as many moments as I can.” <\/p>\n

Yet being friends with rivals “is not possible for everyone,” he admits. “For me, I’m always open on getting along with the people I work with.<\/p>\n

“But there are certainly other people, which is not a bad thing, that maybe want to stick more to themselves and focus on themselves. They don’t want to be friends with other people.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

‘Gaming helps me’<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Racing rivalry is something Norris first got a taste for while playing video games with his siblings as children. <\/p>\n

“Especially with my older brother, there was always a big competition between us both about who could be the best.”<\/p>\n

Speaking to Newsbeat at a launch event for Sega’s new video game, Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, Norris says gaming has helped him get to – and stay – where he is. <\/p>\n

“The main thing I always used to play was driving games – I think that always helped with reactions. I learned how I really didn’t like to lose and I love to win.”<\/p>\n

Now 25 years old and one of the fastest real-life drivers in the world, he believes it benefits him off the track too.<\/p>\n

“Gaming really helps me disconnect from a very chaotic, busy, stressful life.”<\/p>\n

“For me, it’s important to disconnect and feel a little bit more normal again for a period of time,” he adds: “It’s nice to feel like a kid again. It’s important to keep that part of me alive.” <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Lando Norris is nine points behind McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri in the Formula 1 drivers’ standings <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

‘A different me’ on Twitch<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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This love for gaming is something Norris shares with his fans on streaming platform Twitch, where he has 1.8 million followers.<\/p>\n

“It’s quite a different me to what you see on the race track. There, I’m very much in work, driver, I want to win mode – a very determined mindset,” Norris reflects.<\/p>\n

“When I’m at home, I feel the same as everyone. I just want to be online with my friends, we play some games, we have a good laugh, and go to bed.<\/p>\n

“It’s much more personal – forget I’m a racing driver, forget I’m in Formula 1. I like to just hop online and take the mick out of one another and laugh and have a good time.”<\/p>\n

But Norris doesn’t want to “forget” that for long. <\/p>\n

“I don’t get to even call my job a job because it’s what I’ve always loved to do since I was a kid,” he says. <\/p>\n

“I don’t drive because it’s a job, I drive because it’s what I’ve always loved to do.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Whether it’s racing Oscar Piastri for world titles or gaming with his siblings growing up, there’s one thing both versions of Lando Norris have in common: he loves to win. <\/p>\n

So which rivalry is bigger? <\/p>\n

“I certainly had more fights with my siblings when I was a kid than I’ve had with Oscar,” he says.<\/p>\n

“Maybe the meaning of what we’re fighting for is a little bit different, but there was certainly more crying and tears – and fun moments, in some ways – with my siblings than I would say I have with Oscar.<\/p>\n

“Fingers crossed that’s the way it stays. It’s hard to beat sibling rivalries.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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‘It’s tricky’ – Norris on being friends with competitor Piastri F1 driver Lando Norris says it’s “tricky, but certainly not impossible” to be friends with McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri. The pair are in a close battle for the drivers’ championship, with Norris trailing by nine points ahead of the Dutch Grand Prix this weekend. “It’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36120,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[279],"tags":[3085,9124,3225,3226,11605,3544],"class_list":["post-36119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-friends","tag-mclaren","tag-oscar","tag-piastri","tag-teammate","tag-tricky"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36119"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36121,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36119\/revisions\/36121"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}