McLaren team principal Andrea Stella has explained why Lando Norris was called in first during the Hungarian Grand Prix despite running behind Oscar Piastri on track.

Piastri had climbed to second off the start, diving underneath Lewis Hamilton and Norris as they battled into the opening corner.

He then held the place ahead of his McLaren team-mate through the opening laps, until the pit cycle began on Lap 17.

That came in response to Mercedes’ decision to call Hamilton into the lane on Lap 16.

At the time, the Brit was running fourth behind race leader Max Verstappen, Piastri, and Norris.

With the undercut proving powerful around the Hungaroring, Stella explained that McLaren reacted by pitting its most at-risk car.

“In terms of the undercut that we had, at the first stop, you just go really with the sequence that is natural because you cover with a car that is more at risk,” he said.

“Then you cover with the other car.

“Lando’s out lap was just super, super quick, which meant Oscar lost the position.

“To be honest, our approach to these situations is to think about [the] team first, we think as a team, and then we deal with the internal situation.

“When you are fighting against other competitors outside your team, you need to be very careful that you don’t engage an internal battle that will cost the team.

“If we see last year’s race, I think maybe that’s what happened with the red car, and it was very expensive,” he added.

“So we want to stay away from that.”

By the end of that initial pit cycle, Verstappen remained out front (he led every lap) from Norris, with Piastri third ahead of Hamilton.

The pair remained in that order even after the second stop, by which time Sergio Perez had caught and passed them both.

Hamilton finally found his way beyond his McLaren rival on Lap 57, pulling out a 23.4s margin over the Australian in the remaining 13 laps.

“In the second stint, we saw that Lando had a bit more pace {thank Oscar],” Stella added.

“But in fairness, we have to also mention that Oscar had the damage on his car and this meant that he lost a few tenths from a performance point of view, but also we think, because this was a real downfall, suffering this caused extra degradation of the tyres

“That’s part of the reason why he struggled then to keep up with Lando, but also with the other cars coming behind him.”

Piastri held on to fifth in Hungary, surviving ahead of a charging George Russell in the final laps to score his fourth points-finish of the season.

Norris meanwhile recorded McLaren’s second successive podium with second, sandwiched by the Red Bulls of Verstappen and Perez, with Hamilton fourth.