Red Bull couldn’t resist. Within hours of McLaren’s double disqualification in Las Vegas, the team’s sim racing arm fired off a cheeky clip titled “How Not To Get A DQ…” — a quick flick through the F1 game’s setup screen with the ride heights cranked up to the moon. “Just a bit of friendly advice,” read the caption. Subtle? Not remotely. Effective? Judging by the six-figure like count and EA SPORTS F1’s reply — “We do not endorse this savagery (funny tho)” — absolutely.
It was a snarky coda to a night that already had enough plot twists. Max Verstappen banked his sixth win of 2025 under the lights, but the headline shock landed later, when both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri were thrown out of the results for excessive skid-block wear. Norris had finished second on the road and Piastri fifth; by the time the FIA’s measurements were done, they had nothing.
In a season that’s turned sprinting into a marathon, the repercussions are sharp. With two rounds left — Qatar and Abu Dhabi — Oscar Piastri is now level with Verstappen on 366 points, the pair 24 behind championship leader Norris. That’s a remarkable place to be after a DQ, and a reminder that this title fight is tight enough to change shape with a single technical bulletin.
McLaren says there was no dark art at work. Team boss Andrea Stella pointed to unexpected porpoising during the Grand Prix and “accidental damage” discovered post-race, which they believe increased floor movement and led to the wooden plank wearing more than permitted. The stewards noted the breach was unintentional, but the rule is the rule. Stella, contrite but pragmatic, apologised to both drivers — and to the partners and fans — while promising a fast turn on the investigation before Lusail.
The irony, of course, is that McLaren’s ride height headache arrived a month after the very public “tapegate” spat from Austin. Back then, Red Bull was fined €50,000 for a team member stepping onto the grid after the formation lap began, apparently to tamper with a strip of tape McLaren had laid down as a visual marker for Norris. That episode already had the air of schoolyard needling. Las Vegas just poured petrol on it.
Red Bull people are leaning into the moment. Calum Nicholas, the former race mechanic turned team ambassador, admitted he’d resisted cracking jokes “to be a grown up professional.” He added, “It’s fine… but not as much fun.” The sim racing account had no such restraint, and that’s telling. In modern F1, the social feeds punch almost as hard as the aero upgrades.
The competitive tension behind the banter is real. McLaren and Red Bull have orbited each other all year, and the MCL39’s sweet spot has been wide enough to keep Norris ahead despite Verstappen’s Las Vegas win and the stewards’ late twist. Piastri, too, has turned stretches of the season into his own personal highlight reel. That both papaya cars fell foul of the same technicality suggests setup risk on a bumpy, fast street layout met a car working very close to the ground-effect edge.
That edge is a familiar one. Since the return of full-fat ground effect, the plank has become a referee you never see until it blows the whistle. Ride too low, hit too many bumps, porpoise more than expected, and the wood tells the tale — no matter how brilliant the lap times looked. Teams chase millimetres because that’s where downforce lives. Sometimes the millimetres bite back.
So where does this leave the title picture? Norris still holds the cards, Verstappen has the momentum, and Piastri refuses to go away. With Qatar’s sweeping, high-load corners and Abu Dhabi’s tightrope of tyre prep and track evolution to come, there’s enough variation for swings in either direction. Expect a cautious eye on ride heights and floor stiffness in both garages — and a few late-night correlation meetings to make sense of Vegas’ porpoising spike.
There’s also the psychological layer. Verstappen looked loose post-race in Vegas, the image of a driver enjoying the hunt. Norris, after a brilliant drive undone by a technicality, will need to reset quickly. Piastri, level with Verstappen now, has every reason to feel dangerous. Red Bull’s memes might be doing the rounds, but McLaren’s car — disqualification or not — remains fast enough to shut them up by Sunday night.
The social back-and-forth? That’ll rumble on. It’s part of the show, and both teams know it. The difference is that one side leaves Nevada with a trophy and a grin, and the other leaves with a to-do list titled “ride height” in bold. Two rounds left, three protagonists, and almost no margin for error. Friendly advice or not, the championship won’t be decided on Instagram. It’ll be decided by millimetres. And right now, those millimetres feel like miles.
