What McLaren must do to survive Max Verstappen threat

49 days.

That's how long it takes for the greatest racing driver in the world to turn an F1 drivers' championship on its head, in case you were wondering.

In just seven weeks — four rounds, to be exact — Max Verstappen transformed the face of the title fight from an intriguing but strictly McLaren affair into what promises to be one of the most mouth-watering showdowns in the championship's 76-season history.

Over that period, the Red Bull driver slashed Oscar Piastri's advantage from 104 points, after the Dutch Grand Prix, to a mere 40 following the penultimate stateside trip of the campaign.

Lando Norris separates the pair, 14 points adrift of his team-mate in the sister MCL39 after the United States Grand Prix, but with five rounds — including two sprints — to go, the impetus is with the Dutchman.

He has the momentum now and the bit between his teeth. The 28-year-old lacks no motivation to win grands prix and championships, and is clearly relishing the prospect of triumphing in the most improbable of circumstances, in what would arguably be the greatest comeback title win in F1 history.

Before he dragged himself back into contention, I said that whilst Verstappen might not be king this season, he still has the opportunity to be kingmaker. Turns out, he can be both.

However, it is still in McLaren's hands and, crucially, within its control. Max Verstappen is inevitable. Max Verstappen winning this title is not.

The constructors' champions can fend off the threat he poses and, like papaya rules, what it must do to survive the crescendo of the campaign is actually remarkably simple: remove distractions and let Piastri and Norris race without unnecessary noise or consequence. But how?

Reduce the noise — and the consequences

Early in the weekend at the Circuit of the Americas, McLaren invited unnecessary attention and pressure onto the team, creating excessive noise around Piastri and Norris with its frankly bizarre handling of media day. It was vague and opaque.

Karun Chandok put it best when he said the Woking-based squad had taken a "relatively quiet Thursday and exploded it" by allowing its drivers to share that Norris will face "repercussions" for his actions on the first lap of the Singapore Grand Prix but prohibiting them from elaborating on it. Why even mention it at all?

It turns out, as eventually shared by CEO Zak Brown, that those consequences will be of a sporting variety. However, he also insisted they will be "very marginal, and probably won't be noticed" externally.

If the consequence really is "pretty minor", why bother? It does more harm than good to draw it out indefinitely.

It was also quite the U-turn from the team, having judged it to be above board, if a little sketchy, at the time. Whatever Piastri is paying Mark Webber, double it.

Aside from the fact that the stewards also deemed it a racing incident, which was the correct verdict, and that McLaren therefore doled out what feels like a £50 fine for a £5 crime, it was immediately obvious that it left the team exposed.

And it didn't take long for that risk to be realised. It happened at the first available opportunity, no less.

Whilst less aggressive than Norris' approach in Singapore, Piastri's attempted switchback at the first corner in the sprint at COTA was equally misguided and had far greater ramifications than the contact at the Marina Bay Street Circuit, even if it was also correctly determined a racing incident.

So what now? Do they cancel each other out, and you call it quits, having chalked it up as a 1-1 draw, or does McLaren get dragged into a seemingly never-ending cycle of repercussions?

The team has been accused of overmanaging and overengineering; must we add overreacting to the McLaren lexicon as well?

Norris and Piastri have already bought into the team philosophy, so are punishments really required, let alone the broadcast of their existence? It simply adds to the noise of the title fight — and no good can come from that.

Let them race

The good news for McLaren is that broadly speaking, it is already letting Piastri and Norris race, something that it should be commended for.

It has done well at only getting involved when it has deemed it absolutely necessary, like when team mistakes have disadvantaged one of its drivers against the other.

It hasn't been perfect; it has overcomplicated matters at times with needless interference to pit stop strategy — see Monza and almost Singapore — but it has never waivered from its intention to provide both Piastri and Norris an equal footing to compete on, and that's honourable.

And now, as the title fight tightens, that stance extends further, to not giving into the temptation to prioritise one over the other as the threat of Verstappen looms large in the rear-view mirror.

And it makes sense, too. Piastri has the larger advantage, but Norris is the in-form driver out of the two. But then, you cannot possibly choose the latter over the former, who has led the championship since the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. Imagine that conversation...

Plus, what happens if McLaren announces it is prioritising Piastri hereon out, and he retires from the Mexico City Grand Prix whilst Norris wins? All of a sudden, the team has said it is backing a driver now 11 points behind his team-mate in the standings.

McLaren sees it that way, as well. After qualifying in Austin, team principal Andrea Stella said: "The team wants both Oscar and Lando to be able to pursue their aspirations, as long as it is reasonable to do so, and as long as it's reasonable not having to commit to one driver."

There may come a time when Stella and Brown see no other option but to throw the entirety of the team's weight behind one, and that decision will be governed only by numerics.

On Sunday evening, the Italian elaborated: "When it comes to having to make a call as to a driver, this will only be led by mathematics... we are not going to close the door, unless this is closed by mathematics."

Whether that means one has to be completely ruled out of contention, or if it merely means the maths needs to be considerably against one, remains to be seen.

But it really is that simple. McLaren is already letting Piastri and Norris race; now it must remove the noise and the risk of consequences for fighting for the title, and prevent papaya rules from descending into papaya repercussions.

Either Piastri or Norris can win this thing; it need not be Verstappen.

The Dutchman is inevitable; his taking the crown is not. McLaren needs only to get out of the way.