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Despite the hype around the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Lando Norris is keeping a calm demeanor regarding his prospects of claiming his first drivers' championship.

Norris presently has a two-dozen point advantage over teammate Oscar Piastri and is ahead of Max Verstappen by nearly fifty points, with just up to 83 points available across the final three races. However, after pulling off a remarkable comeback from a significant deficit his teammate after the Dutch Grand Prix in the summer, Norris is focused on performing with the clinical precision that propelled him to the top of the standings.

"Things can easily turn the opposite way again as much as I don't want it to," he stated. "That's racing, you know. Sometimes you also have luck. Other times you end up unlucky. No matter what happens. It's not worth becoming overjoyed or thinking about it. I still do see it as a goal that's quite far away."

Norris has found his peak performance at a critical juncture—having struggled with the car in the first part of the season—while his teammate has lost the disciplined, nearly flawless composure that had for so long made him appear to be a future title winner. Importantly, Norris kept a impressive level of equanimity all along, asserting despite challenges—like his withdrawal from the Zandvoort race—that he would stick to his gameplan and work every outing with the same relentless attention to detail. It has yielded results.

Meanwhile, McLaren have worked hard to try to preserve a fair competition for their pair of racers, and it has on occasion been a rather torturous experience, especially at Monza when the squad directed Piastri to cede second place to Norris following he had lost the spot because of a delayed tire change. Some fans did not take well to what was considered McLaren needlessly manipulating their drivers.

Norris has claimed victory in the previous pair of grands prix, in Mexico City and Brazil, and was booed on the winner's rostrum at each, yet he remained unfazed. "When you're leading, a lot of people try to bring you down. They do not want to see you succeeding. I consider it a positive sign," he remarked.

"It just amuses me. While standing on the podium in Brazil, I really enjoyed it. The experience was quite satisfying. You finally sense that you are achieving something right.

"I don't mind, provided that I come out on top. As long as I believe I'm doing it the correct way, and I think I am, as long as I am confident I'm putting effort into remaining true to myself and similar principles, then I am not concerned with external opinions."

Vegas, meanwhile, must be conquered, and it is not a track ideal for the McLaren. It shares similarities with Montreal and Baku: minimal aerodynamic grip, cool temperatures, and slippery surfaces. They are the only two tracks this season where McLaren have failed to secure at least one podium place, and the leader was circumspect once more about their prospects this weekend. Still, his task in the immediate future is straightforward: end the race in front of his teammate and the championship tally he needs will come.

Practice Shows Mixed Outcomes for Title Rivals

Charles Leclerc topped the times in first practice on what was still a dusty and very slippery track. Alex Albon was runner-up, with the Red Bull star fourth, Norris sixth, and the Australian in eighth. In the more representative evening session of FP2, Norris was fastest from the Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli, with Piastri down in fourteenth; however, the session lost almost all of the last third of running to check a suspected loose manhole cover at turn 17.

This problem is taken seriously on a temporary track where, at the first Las Vegas GP staged in 2023, a dislodged drain cover struck the Ferrari, heavily harming it and leading to the session to be ended.

Mercedes Announce Ownership Transaction

The eight-time constructors' champions have confirmed that their boss the Austrian executive has sold a 15% stake in his holding company, equating to a five percent ownership in the squad, to US tycoon George Kurtz. Kurtz is the chief executive and creator of the digital protection firm CrowdStrike. The team principal will stay on as boss and could earn up to £230m from the deal, with Mercedes having been appraised at £4.57 billion, a new high for an F1 team.