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Despite all excitement surrounding the Sin City Grand Prix, Lando Norris is maintaining a calm demeanor about his prospects of claiming his maiden world title.

The British driver currently has a two-dozen point lead over fellow McLaren driver Oscar Piastri and leads Max Verstappen by nearly fifty points, with only up to eighty-three points up for grabs across the remaining trio of events. However, after staging a extraordinary comeback from a significant deficit Piastri following the Dutch Grand Prix in August, Norris is concentrating on performing with the methodical approach that propelled him to the top of the championship.

"Things can easily turn in the other direction again even though I don't want it to," he stated. "That's racing, you know. Sometimes you also have luck. You can end up unlucky. Whatever it may be. There's really not worth getting excited or thinking about it. I still view it as something that remains distant."

The 26-year-old has found his peak performance at a critical juncture—having struggled with the car in the opening half of the campaign—while Piastri has lost the disciplined, almost flawless ease that previously made him appear to be a champion in waiting. Importantly, Norris kept a remarkable level of composure all along, insisting despite challenges—like his retirement from the Zandvoort race—that he would stick to his strategy and approach every outing with the same relentless attention to detail. This approach has paid off.

Meanwhile, the team have worked hard to try to preserve a fair competition for their pair of racers, and it has on occasion been a rather difficult experience, most notably at the Italian Grand Prix when the team instructed Piastri to cede second place to Norris after he had fallen behind because of a slow pit stop. Some fans did not take well to what was considered the team unnecessarily manipulating their competitors.

The championship leader has won the last two grands prix, in Mexico and Brazil, and was jeered on the podium at each, yet he remained unfazed. "Once you are leading, a lot of people try to bring you down. They do not like seeing you succeeding. I see it as a positive sign," he remarked.

"It amuses me. While standing on the podium in Brazil, I truly enjoyed it. The experience was quite enjoyable. You finally feel like you're doing success.

"I don't mind, as long as I come out on top. If I feel like I'm doing it the correct way, and I think I am, as long as I am confident I am dedicating hard work into remaining true to myself and those kinds of things, then I am not concerned with external opinions."

Las Vegas, on the other hand, must be conquered, and it is a circuit ideal for the McLaren. The layout has similarities with Canada and Azerbaijan: low downforce, chilly conditions, and slippery surfaces. They are the sole pair of tracks this season where McLaren have been unable to claim a single podium place, and Norris was cautious again about their chances this weekend. Still, his task in the immediate future is simple: end the race in ahead of Piastri and the championship tally he needs will follow.

Practice Shows Mixed Results for Title Contenders

The Ferrari driver led the times in FP1 on what was still a dusty and extremely slippery track. Alex Albon was runner-up, with the Red Bull star fourth, Norris in P6, and the Australian eighth. During the more representative night running of FP2, Norris was fastest ahead of the Silver Arrows of the Italian rookie, with his teammate down in fourteenth; however, the practice lost almost all of the final 20 minutes of running to inspect a reported unsecured manhole cover at the penultimate corner.

This problem is treated with caution on a street circuit where, at the inaugural Las Vegas GP staged in 2023, a dislodged manhole smashed into Carlos Sainz's Ferrari, severely damaging it and causing the practice to be ended.

Mercedes Announce Ownership Sale

The eight-time constructors' champions have revealed that their team principal Toto Wolff has sold a 15% stake in his holding company, representing a 5% share in the squad, to American billionaire the cybersecurity magnate. The investor 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 Mercedes having been valued at £4.57 billion, a new high for an F1 team.