McLaren CEO Zak Brown feels Oscar Piastri’s level of maturity caught him by surprise throughout the Australian’s rookie season in F1.
Piastri underlined just why McLaren fought Alpine for the services of the 22-year-old whose future was ultimately determined by a Contract Recognition Board hearing last summer.
That allowed Piastri to leave Alpine, even though it was the French team that had helped nurture him through the junior ranks in which he won the F3 and F2 titles in back-to-back seasons before a year on the sidelines, during which time he was lured by McLaren.
Following a difficult start to the year due to McLaren being behind with its development of the MCL60, Piastri’s season finally took off at the British Grand Prix when a much-needed upgrade was delivered on his side of the garage.
It then became obvious as to why McLaren had poached Piastri as he delivered several stand-out drives, with the highlights being his first podium in Japan, followed swiftly by a sprint win from pole position in Qatar where he was also second in the grand prix.
Reflecting on Piastri’s campaign, speaking to selected media, Brown said: “I’m impressed.
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“I’m surprised at how mature he is. He does not try and win on Friday, so there have been some race weekends where you see him on Friday, and you go ‘Is he going to get there on Saturday?’, and he does, and he’s very close to (team-mate) Lando (Norris).
“So I think his maturity has surprised me, his ability to learn has surprised me, and his calmness has surprised me for a driver of his age and inexperience in Formula 1, and the rust that he should have had, that he got rid of pretty quickly, for him sitting out a year.
“The speed hasn’t surprised me. I would have expected another shunt or two, I would have expected a few more off weekends. He hasn’t (had those).”
By his own admission, the only blemish on Piastri’s campaign were the difficulties he encountered in race management, with the race at Suzuka underlining that as he started second, but lacked pace compared to Norris, finishing 17 seconds adrift of the Briton by the chequered flag.
Brown, though, feels the inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix just two months later showed Piastri was quickly learning. Although he only claimed a point for 10th, it was from a difficult position after an early collision with Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton.
“With his (in)experience, his race management just takes time,” said Brown. “These tyres are tricky, managing a Formula 1 race is tricky.
“His race in Vegas was, I think, his best race of the year as far as what he was dealt with, and the way he performed was awesome.
“So you just see that his learning of how to manage a race weekend is just getting stronger and stronger, which leads me to think we have the best driver line-up in.”
Expanding on why he feels that is the case, Brown added: “I’m very happy Oscar has performed in the way he has, and we’ve got visibility as to what our driver line-up looks like for the foreseeable future.
“We’ve a very experienced 24-year-old and an awesome rookie at 22. That’s a pretty awesome driver line-up as I look at what we need to get back to winning world championships, starting with two drivers who are capable of winning the world championship.”
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