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Amid all excitement around the Sin City Grand Prix, Lando Norris is keeping a calm demeanor regarding his prospects of claiming his first drivers' championship.

Norris currently holds a 24-point advantage over teammate Oscar Piastri and leads Max Verstappen by nearly fifty points, with only a maximum of 83 points up for grabs across the remaining trio of races. However, after staging a extraordinary comeback from a significant deficit Piastri following the Zandvoort race in August, Norris is focused on executing with the methodical approach that propelled him to the lead of the championship.

"Things can quickly turn in the other direction again even though I don't want it to," he stated. "That's motorsport, as we all know. Sometimes you also have luck. You can end up unlucky. No matter what happens. It's not worth becoming overjoyed or thinking about it. I continue to do see it as something that remains far away."

Norris has found his best form at a critical moment—having struggled with the vehicle in the opening half of the campaign—while his teammate has shed the disciplined, nearly perfect composure that had for so long made him appear to be a future title winner. Notably, Norris maintained a remarkable level of composure all along, asserting even in the face of challenges—such as his retirement from the Zandvoort race—that he would stick to his gameplan and approach every outing with the same relentless attention to detail. This approach has paid off.

All the while, McLaren have worked hard to try to maintain a fair competition for their pair of racers, and it has at times been a rather difficult process, most notably at the Italian Grand Prix when the squad directed Piastri to surrender second place to his teammate following he had lost the spot because of a slow pit stop. Certain spectators were unhappy with what was considered McLaren needlessly interfering with their drivers.

Norris has won the last two grands prix, in Mexico and São Paulo, and was booed on the winner's rostrum at both, leaving him unmoved. "Once you are on top, a lot of individuals try to undermine you. They do not like seeing you succeeding. I consider it a good thing," he said.

"It just makes me laugh. While standing on the winner's stage in Interlagos, I truly loved it. The experience was quite satisfying. At last you feel like you are achieving something right.

"It doesn't bother me, provided that I come out on top. As long as I feel like I'm doing it the right way, and I think I am, so long as I am confident I'm putting effort into being who I am and those kinds of things, then I am not concerned about the rest of it."

Vegas, meanwhile, must be conquered, and it is a circuit suited to the McLaren. The layout has similarities with Canada and Azerbaijan: low downforce, cool temperatures, and slippery surfaces. They are the only two tracks in the current championship where McLaren have failed to claim at least one podium place, and the leader was cautious once more about their prospects this weekend. Still, his task in the short term is simple: end the race in ahead of Piastri and the championship tally he requires will come.

Practice Sees Varied Outcomes for Title Contenders

The Ferrari driver led the leaderboard in FP1 on what was still a sandy and extremely slippery surface. The Williams racer was runner-up, with Verstappen in fourth, the McLaren ace in P6, and Piastri in eighth. During the more representative evening session of FP2, Norris was quickest from the Mercedes of the Italian rookie, with Piastri down in fourteenth; however, the practice was interrupted for almost all of the last third of running to inspect a reported unsecured manhole cover at turn 17.

The issue is taken seriously on a temporary track where, at the inaugural Nevada GP held in 2023, a dislodged manhole struck Carlos Sainz's Ferrari, severely damaging it and causing the session to be ended.

Mercedes Announce Ownership Transaction

Mercedes have confirmed that their boss Toto Wolff has sold a 15% stake in his investment firm, representing a 5% share in the squad, to American billionaire George Kurtz. Kurtz is the chief executive and creator of the cybersecurity company the tech giant. Wolff will remain as team principal and could earn up to £230m from the deal, with the Brackley-based outfit having been appraised at £4.57bn, a record for an Formula 1 constructor.