Norris Moves Closer to Title as Verstappen Takes Las Vegas Grand Prix Win

The McLaren Lando Norris stepped closer to a maiden championship with second place in the Vegas race behind the Red Bull of Max Verstappen

Norris now leads fellow McLaren driver Oscar Piastri, who ended up in fourth place behind the Mercedes of George Russell, by thirty points heading to the second-to-last race in Qatar this coming weekend

Norris will secure the title in the Qatar as long as he doesn't surrender over five points to Piastri in Losail, or seventeen to Verstappen

Piastri, so impressive in the first half of the season, has not finished on the top three for six races

"Verstappen had a strong performance. I made the mistake at the beginning and was overly aggressive on that opening corner," stated Norris

"It remains a positive outcome to get second. I've got to praise Max and his team"

After Qatar, the last event of the championship takes place in Abu Dhabi on December 7th

The main developments of among Formula 1's most prestigious races included:

• Lando Norris continued his momentum towards the championship losing the victory to Max Verstappen

• Piastri's challenging performance streak continued as his championship chances diminish

• A excellent win for Max Verstappen to keep him in the title fight

• Fightbacks for the two Ferrari drivers, after a difficult qualifying, with Lewis Hamilton claiming a point for tenth place after beginning at the back

From the beginning, Lando Norris was true to his statement that he was "not here not to take risks" as he fought hard to defend his advantage from pole position from Max Verstappen

However following an forceful move in front of Verstappen to head off the Verstappen's challenge on the inner line, Norris miscalculated his braking point and went too deep into the turn

That enabled Verstappen to drive past into the lead while Norris lost second place to Russell

During two virtual safety cars for several opening-lap incidents, featuring at the beginning when Racing Bulls' Liam Lawson made contact with Oscar Piastri, Max Verstappen gradually stamped his authority on the event

Russell undertook an early pit stop for the hard tyres, but Norris and Verstappen remained on track

The McLaren driver stopped five circuits following the Mercedes and Max Verstappen ten laps later

The Red Bull driver was able to rejoin still in the lead, George Russell having been unable to close in on the Red Bull despite his newer rubber

Lando Norris returned after Russell from his stop but following a several careful circuits to let his tires to warm up, soon closed his 3.3-second gap to the Mercedes and overtook into runner-up position on lap 34

The British driver inquired his engineer how to run the rest of his race, essentially asking whether he should accept second place or challenge for the lead

He was told to "chase down Max" but it soon became clear he had little opportunity. Max Verstappen was easily able to defend against Norris' attacks, and in the final laps the gap increased substantially as the McLaren began to suffer a technical issue which has so far not been defined

Even with dropping almost three seconds a lap, Norris was able to defend against George Russell because of the size of the advantage he had built while pursuing Max Verstappen

The Red Bull driver's sixth victory of the championship - just one behind the two McLaren teammates - was taken in dominant fashion and maintains him in title contention, at least mathematically, although he needs problems for Norris in both remaining races to overtake him

"It remains a significant margin, we consistently attempt to maximise everything we've have," Max Verstappen stated

"During the coming events we will attempt to win the event and by the conclusion of Abu Dhabi we will see where we finish, but I'm extremely pleased of everyone"

Piastri started in fifth but dropped two places on the first circuit following being clouted by Lawson, who was soon eliminated of the battle by a broken front wing

He followed Lawson's team-mate Isack Hadjar for the first 15 laps before overtaking him on the Strip but lost out to Charles Leclerc, who he was able to overtake again during the tire change phase

The Australian ended up behind Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli, who ran nearly the whole event on hard tyres after pitting during the initial VSC, but was given a five second penalty for a start-line infringement, which was not immediately obvious on replays

"It was a frustrating race from essentially beginning to end in certain respects," Piastri told BBC Radio 5 Live

Asked about how he would approach the final two races, he commented: "Simply attempt to put myself in the best position I can. I obviously require quite a lot of things to go my way at this stage to win, but my only option is ensure I'm in the ideal situation to capitalise if circumstances change"

Charles Leclerc held on in sixth position, not close enough to gain from Kimi Antonelli's time penalty, while Sainz fell to seventh place at the flag, his Williams car lacking the speed to challenge with the leading outfits in the dry, following his impressive showing to start in third in the wet

Hadjar secured eighth ahead of Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg and Lewis Hamilton

The seven-time title winner executed a flying start, up to 13th on the first lap and proceeded to advance positions

He became trapped in a DRS train with a bunch of additional vehicles but was could use his electric start to rescue a point following the poorest qualifying performance of his career