Horner puzzled by strange tactic in Japanese GP: 'It made no sense'

Christian Horner has explained how Red Bull did not fall for McLaren's "dummy" trick with Lando Norris in the Japanese Grand Prix.

Running within the usual undercut window behind race-leader Max Verstappen, McLaren called Norris into pit. Ultimately he stayed out, with third-placed Oscar Piastri pitting soon after instead.

This meant McLaren had to pit Norris at the end of lap 21 to avoid him being undercut by Piastri, with Red Bull simply covering off Norris with Verstappen - the latter emerging just in the lead after a slower stop. 

Verstappen would go on to win from Norris and Piastri, leaving Red Bull team principal Christian Horner to raise his eyebrows over McLaren's original call.

"It was clear that as the pit-stops were approaching, McLaren had elected to pit Oscar first, but prior to that, they called a dummy with Lando that really to us, didn't make any sense," Horner told media including RacingNews365. 

"Because he would have just come out in traffic, so we stuck to our guns and didn't react to the dummy. 

"They then pitted Oscar, and Lando pitted the following lap, so it was a matter of covering Lando, but we didn't have a totally clean pit-stop as we had a reserve crew with two members missing (for personal reasons). 

"Lando got close-ish at the exit, but was never alongside or anything like that and with the hard tyres for 30-odd laps, Max had the pace to cover whatever McLaren could throw at us.

"At different times, one minute it was Lando, then the next minute Oscar looked very quick, but overtaking throughout the field was negligible."