Frederic Vasseur has been nicknamed the ‘little menace’ by the F1 community ever since he made the move to Ferrari. The Ferrari TP has changed around the structure of the team, sacked Carlos Sainz for Lewis Hamilton, and is now rumored to sign Adrian Newey. And while Vasseur isn’t like Christian Horner or Toto Wolff when it comes to slamming another team, the Frenchman takes cheeky little shots at others, in a very subtle way, that conveys his message well. The same was done by him after Lando Norris’ win, despite celebrating it with McLaren.

Lando Norris’ victory was a huge milestone not only for Lando Norris, who won it after 110 race starts but also for McLaren. It highlights that the Papaya team can beat the Red Bulls, and cannot be discounted as title contenders. Both Norris and Zak Brown celebrated the win as if they’d won the world championship, with Brown running all around the paddock. And while it looked like Norris won on pure pace after the safety car, Verstappen did pick up some floor damage from hitting the bollard. And of course, the safety car didn’t favor the Dutchman. 

Regardless, Frédéric Vasseur let go of the rivalry between Ferrari and McLaren, two of the oldest teams in F1, and went ahead to celebrate the win with the McLaren team. As the team got the trophy, champagne, and boards ready in the pit lane, Vasseur sneaked in and cheered the Papaya team. A McLaren cap was thrown Vasseur’s way, and the Frenchman obliged to wear it and later sprayed champagne on the McLaren team members. 

Despite all that, Frederic Vasseur is now out of the jovial mood and back to business, as he talked about how teams are closer to Red Bull this year, but the Milton-Keynes-based team still has an advantage. He then explained how Max Verstappen could’ve won the race without the safety car, and took the shine off Norris’ win while doing so. According to Motorsport, he said, “Honestly, Red Bull is still ahead. Probably Max could have won today without the story of the safety car. They did the pole position, which means they still have a small advantage.”

McLaren Team Principal Andrea Stella agrees with Frederic Vasseur on the fact that Red Bull is still in the lead in terms of performance. 

Andrea Stella advises Red Bull is still the team to beat despite Lando Norris’ Miami Win

When looking at the incident in slow motion, where Max Verstappen hit the bollard, a part of his underfloor can be seen breaking off the car, and probably causing a lot of rear grip issues. Regardless, Verstappen complained about the grip throughout the weekend in Miami. He even complained about the same in the pole lap during the Sprint qualifying. This shows how much pace the Red Bull has when despite struggling, the car took the pole and finished the race P2 after the untimely Safety car. 

The McLaren TP also considered these factors as Andrea Stella, after the Miami GP said, “Yes, we improved the car. We know in the numbers how much we improved it and its material, you should see it in lap time. But for Red Bull, this race was a little bit of a struggle. Is the pace we saw a representation of the future? I’m not going to put my signature on this statement…I think here Red Bull didn’t get the most out of their package.”

But what is your opinion on Lando Norris’ first win? Was the Brit just lucky or did he have pure pace to beat Max Verstappen?