Norris vows full-on response to Dutch setback

Formula One title contender Lando Norris vowed a full-on response for the rest of the season after a Dutch Grand Prix retirement dealt a significant blow to his championship hopes on Sunday.

Norris will have his work cut out. He is 34 points behind McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri with nine rounds, plus three sprint races, remaining and the Australian a model of consistency and exuding quiet confidence.

Piastri has won seven times this campaign, to Norris' five, and been off the podium only twice in 15 races. Apart from ninth in his home season-opener, he has not finished lower than fourth.

"The only thing I can do is try to win every race. That's going to be difficult but I'll make sure I give it everything I can," Norris told reporters after retiring from second place with seven laps to go at Zandvoort.

"The pace was very strong today. There are so many positives, it's just close. I have a good teammate, he's strong, he's quick in every situation, every scenario.

"It's hard to get things back on someone who's just good in pretty much every situation."

Norris missed out on pole position to Piastri by milliseconds on Saturday, small margins making a huge difference at a track where overtaking – particularly a rival with the same car and engine – is difficult.

The Briton had been accused of getting lucky in some previous wins but he could not be accused of that on Sunday.

Norris had not suffered a retirement due to reliability, rather than a crash or collision, since a gearbox failure in Brazil in 2022.

Modern F1 engines and cars are so reliable that the sight of a driver pulling over is now rare compared to the not so distant past.

"It's just unlucky, it's not my fault and sometimes that's just racing," Norris said.

"It certainly hasn't helped (the championship battle), it's only made it harder for me and put me under more pressure.

"But it's almost a big enough gap now that I can just chill out about it and just go for it."

McLaren have refrained from imposing any team orders on their drivers, other than telling them not to collide and show mutual respect under so-called 'Papaya rules'.

With the team so far ahead in the constructors' standings – their lead over Ferrari now stretched to 324 points – that the title will soon be retained and any brake on the drivers' duel released.

That individual battle remains a two-horse race with Piastri now 104 points clear of Red Bull's Max Verstappen, his closest rival outside McLaren.

FIRST PODIUM COULD BE A GLIMPSE OF THE FUTURE FOR HADJAR

Isack Hadjar provided a likely glimpse of the future as the French rookie stepped up to the Formula One podium for the first time alongside Red Bull's four-time world champion Max Verstappen.

Third place in Sunday's Dutch Grand Prix, with Verstappen second in front of his home fans, was a dream come true for the 20-year-old who became the fifth youngest driver to finish in the top three.

Hadjar is already on a fast track to promotion to the Red Bull senior team and his podium was in stark contrast to the result of Verstappen's current teammate Yuki Tsunoda, who finished ninth.

"It feels great. Max is someone I’ve been looking up to since my junior days," said Hadjar, who is of Algerian descent.

"The last five years have been outstanding. To share the track, spend most of the race behind him, being within two or three seconds the whole time, and share my first podium with him on his home soil as well, I think it’s pretty cool."

The podium was an even greater contrast to his debut in Australia in March which ended before it had even started after he crashed his car backwards into the wall on the formation lap.

"After what happened in Australia, in the car, obviously, I thought my life was over, but then you realise it can happen and you bounce back very quickly from that," he said.

"Then to have a podium without too much miracles and not much going on ahead – no, I didn’t expect it, especially that fast in the season.

"Already finishing fourth on pure pace would have been a mighty result. But finishing third, I’m just over the moon."

The rookie, who has now scored 37 of his team's 60 point haul from 15 races, started fourth – with Verstappen third – and inherited the podium after McLaren's title contender Lando Norris retired from second place with seven laps to go.

"It feels a bit unreal. What was most surprising to me is keeping that fourth place for the whole race," he said.

"But we did no mistake. The car was on rails the whole weekend and I'm really happy about myself because I really maximised what I had. Made no mistakes and brought home the podium.

"So, this is a first step, my first podium, and hopefully many more to come."

With his old Racing Bulls boss Laurent Mekies now principal at Red Bull, after Christian Horner was dismissed, there is every chance of that.