Oscar Piastri - the man who aspires to become a new F1 champion
He came to Formula 1 in 2023 after a huge controversy. He was planning to sign with Alpine, nonetheless, he changed his mind in a very last moment and signed with McLaren. This appeared to be a massive decision and probably to most crucial moment of his career.
Oscar Jack Piastri, born in 2001 in Melbourne, Australia, is probably the most talented F1 driver that appeared on the F1 grid in this decade. He showed his talent in 2020 after winning a Formula 3 championship as a rookie as well as the 2021 Formula 2 championship. As a Alpine academy driver, both the driver and the team decided to give him one extra year outside the Formula 1, because they had a stable line-up. Esteban Ocon won a Grand Prix with Alpine in 2021 and Fernando Alonso is a 2-time world champion with amazing racecraft. Alonso went to Aston Martin in 2023, nevertheless, Piastri signed with McLaren instead replacing Daniel Ricciardo. Why? Because McLaren has a better potential to win races overall. Furthermore, Piastri is a millennial talent, but I'll talk about his abilities later on.
However, you will never get the high without the low. In the beginning of 2023, McLaren struggled a lot with competitivity. In his first ever Grand Prix in Bahrain, Piastri qualified 18th and had to retire in the race due to issue with a steering wheel. Although the team could not really produce a faster car, Piastri finished on points in his third career race in Australia finishing in eighth. To score a bigger amount of points, he had to wait until the British Grand Prix. McLaren brought a massive upgrade and suddenly, they were competing against unbeatable Max Verstappen. He achieved two podiums in the remaining races and even won the sprint in Qatar!
2024 might be considered as another impressive year in McLaren's and Piastri's history. Throughout the year, Oscar was consistently scoring points. In fact, he scored points in 23 races out of 24, which is really impressive. Moreover, he hadn't retired from any race that season. Furthermore, he won first two races in his F1 career. First was a little bit controversial - the Hungarian GP, where he overtook Lando Norris on start, however, after pit-stop, Oscar came out of box behind Lando. Although Lando fought for World Championship at that time and every point counted, he had to let Piastri through. The atmosphere was cold in the McLaren HQ after that race. Lando was angry, Oscar not really happy. Luckily, he could truly celebrate a few months larer in the Azerbaijan GP, after overtaking Charles Leclerc for the first place with magnificently late brakes. Additionally, Oscar helped McLaren to achive the Constructors World Championship that year.
And 2025? McLaren built a solid car again and Piastri is on the verge this year. In Australia, he made a little mistake on wet track and in Japan it was impossible to overtake his teammate. Besides that, he has won 3 out of 5 Grand Prix so far. Additionally, he is leading the championship by 10 points from Lando Norris, who does not seems to be that quick this year. Moreover, many experts and fans think that Oscar has the winning mentality, as opposed to Lando. During the race, he is incredibly calm, even if he is involved in some incident, for instance. He is not doing any inappropriate moves when he is stuck behind someone in the race. And most importantly, he is somehow avoiding the attention from media so he is not under pressure.
In conclusion, if you ask me who will become a Formula 1 champion this year, I would say Oscar Piastri.
Jakub Ondruš
Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Piastri</p>
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/09/15/sport/oscar-piastri-azerbaijan-grand-prix-spt-intl/index.html<br>