Despite McLaren’s insistence that both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri will be allowed to race each other for the championship during the F1 2025 season, the Australian Grand Prix saw the first “hold position” instruction of the season.

According to team boss Andrea Stella, the goal was not to dissuade the drivers from battling one another, but to give McLaren time to sort out what it didn’t know in terms of weather, track position, and more.

McLaren boss: “We didn’t know” how long the ‘hold position’ mandate would stand

Papaya rules. It’s almost assured that modern Formula 1 fans have plenty of thoughts on the slogan that represents McLaren’s driving ethos between drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri: Both drivers are equals, and both are encouraged to battle for wins, so long as they’re respectful to one another.

As the 2025 season built up in anticipation of the Australian Grand Prix, the “papaya rules” were revisited, with McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown reaffirming that he feels his team has employed two first-class drivers who are encouraged to battle one another should that be necessary.

But during the first stages of the Australian Grand Prix, all these grand plans flew out the window when second-placed Oscar Piastri was told to “hold position” behind race leader Lando Norris.

Piastri acknowledged and accepted the instruction, though he did note to the team that he felt he “was quicker” than his teammate. Not long after, the Australian driver erred, losing out on his chance to attack Norris; only after that happened were the drivers told they could fight again.

Instant concerns were raised about the state of play between the drivers — but team boss Andrea Stella is adamant that it was the right thing to do, not to prevent the drivers from fighting, but to allow the team to get a better handle on a changing situation.

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In fact, Stella even explained to media after the race that the team “didn’t know ourselves how long this [hold position] period would have been.”

When asked about the issuing of the ‘hold position’ order, Stella explained, “During the race at some stage, we had to go relatively soon to some backmarkers while the cars were close together and the conditions on track were still a little tricky, with intermediate tires that were running down a bit in terms of their rubber.

“At the same time we were receiving some updates on the weather forecast.

“So we had the going through the backmarkers, and the update on the weather forecast that led us to close for a short period of time the internal racing between our two drivers, until we had clarity as to the weather prediction, what this meant for how we should use the tires, and then until we had closed the matter of overtaking the backmarkers.

“So once this was completed and the weather was reassessed, then we re-opened the racing.”

Stella was asked if the drivers were aware that the ‘hold position’ warning was temporary, and that this mandate would be lifted — but in the way Stella responded, it seems the team principal didn’t think that was the right question to ask.

“The drivers were aware when we gave the team order to hold positions, and then they were aware when we told them to be free to race,” he said. “In the meantime, I’ll have to review the communications with the drivers.”

However, the root of the issue was the fact that, with so many variables converging at that exact moment in the race, McLaren determined that allowing its drivers to race would have been the wrong call.

“Like, we didn’t even know ourself how long this period would have been until the weather forecast would become a little clearer,” he explained.

“So we just tried to keep this period as short as possible. And the drivers know that this is the case, so we don’t want to make it unnecessarily long.”

It is a strong enough reasoning, though it remains unclear if the drivers were aware of the logic behind the order in the heat of the battle.

Stella was further quizzed on whether or not he felt the ‘hold position’ mandate disrupted Oscar Piastri; not long after the issue was ordered, the Australian driver began to make small mistakes that dropped him out of the fight with Norris.

“I don’t know exactly what kind of issues he might have had in terms of pace in this place of the race,” Stella said of Piastri, “but I suspect it might have to do with these little issues that pushing at that level in those conditions I’ve seen regularly on either of the drivers.”

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