McLaren ‘in the leading position’ as Stella eyes intense four-team battle in Miami

A stunning lap from Lando Norris saw the 2025 World Champion claim Sprint Qualifying pole, with McLaren sending an ominous message to the rest of the grid as Oscar Piastri took P3, just behind Kimi Antonelli.

Ferrari and Red Bull also showed some fine pace in the only free practice session of the weekend after bringing several updates to South Florida, while Mercedes look to have been caught a little bit cold.

As a result, a positive Stella was impressed with what he saw from his team, but also stated that Sunday's Grand Prix could see a fantastic battle between all four teams.

"We have had some encouraging indications in practice when we saw the upgrades we brought here delivered as expected. When we saw the list of upgrades, we saw everyone had a new car, or at least 50 per cent of the pit lane," Stella said to Sky Sports after Sprint Qualifying.

During the five-week break from racing, one of the biggest pieces of breaking news was that Max Verstappen's race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase would be leaving Red Bull to join McLaren.

The move would see the British-Italian engineer become the Chief Racing Officer at the British team, with that move taking place no later than 2028.

However, team principal Laurent Mekies said to Sky Sports F1 that Lambiase would become the team principal at McLaren when he moved away from the Austrian team.

"'GP' had an extraordinary opportunity. He's going to be a team principal there. [I can't] do anything else [other] than wishing him well," the Frenchman stated.