McLaren's deja vu moment should spell the end of its…

A McLaren driver taking a healthy dose of risk at the start of a race, making contact with a third party and then swiping his team-mate. Sound familiar?

The start of Austin's sprint race bore an uncanny resemblance to the start of the Singapore Grand Prix two weeks ago, except this time the roles were reversed and the consequences were more impactful, as Piastri's contact with Norris ended both of their races and handed eight free points to emerging title contender Max Verstappen.

That's not to say Piastri committed a huge mistake in Austin, far from it. But making such a cutback at COTA's steep and wide Turn 1 is risky business, with a guarantee that at least one car will be trying to lunge down the inside. Was Piastri too focused on defeating his own team-mate to take that classic scenario into account?

Bad news - it wasn't one but two cars, as Nico Hulkenberg was sandwiched by both the Australian and Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso, leaving the German with nowhere to go as the contact triggered a shower of carbon fibre. It made McLaren CEO Zak Brown's instant finger pointing at Hulkenberg a bit of a head scratcher, as much as it is his duty to protect his own drivers.

(Update - Brown later retracted his "heat of the moment" comments on Sky Sports, saying "I don't think that's on Nico.")

The fairest verdict for the Texan Turn 1 rodeo is a racing incident, but if you are leading the championship it's sometimes better to be safe than right. There were still 19 laps to hound Norris, and both McLarens had a good shot of defeating an only moderately fast Verstappen rather than gifting him more points.

Again, this is not intended to be a stick to beat Piastri with. The point is that if you're Lando Norris and you're watching the replays, surely you'll be wondering if this is a very similar scenario to Singapore, which the Briton then faced undisclosed "repercussions" for.

Are those consequences - whether it's related to qualifying order priority or something else - now going to be undone? Reversed?

(Photo by: Sam Bloxham / LAT Images via Getty Images)

Arguably, the correct answer is that Piastri doesn't deserve any repercussions at all, and neither did Norris. Because he was trying to win a motor race, he raced the cars around him hard but fair and in the process made a slight misjudgement, as did Norris two weeks ago. Contact with your team-mate is motor racing's cardinal sin, but sometimes that just happens.

In fairness to McLaren, it does deserve more sympathy than people seem to extend at this stage of the season. Yes, there are nine competitors who would love to be in the position of the recently crowned constructors' champion and its luxury problem right now. But the squad has thus far managed to have two number one drivers vie for the world title without them wanting to take each other's head off or make a beeline for the McLaren Technology Centre's large glass exit doors.

That is an admirable, rare feat in F1. Unheard of, really. And it is great for neutrals that Norris and Piastri are both able to chase their own title aspirations without the team backing one over the other prematurely.

But the spectre of its ill-advised Monza position swap keeps hanging over the team, with it now painting itself into a corner to keep righting any wrongs, trying to control the uncontrollable of F1's fastest-ever generation of cars racing at the edge of adhesion. And all that man-management keeps dominating the conversation rather than the racing itself.

By trying not to interfere it feels like McLaren has interfered too much.

With the counterbalancing drama of Singapore and Austin's sprint out of the way, can Norris and Piastri now just get on with it?