Oscar Piastri Dismisses McLaren Sabotage Theories

Oscar Piastri has dismissed the growing conspiracy theories that McLaren has been favouring Lando Norris in the Formula 1 title fight, insisting his recent loss of form has clear, technical explanations rather than anything political within the team.

The Australian driver has seen a 34-point lead over teammate Norris disappear since the Dutch Grand Prix in August. Norris moved one point ahead after winning in Mexico, where he was booed by sections of the crowd. A local journalist later told him the reaction was linked to a belief among fans that McLaren was prioritising his title hopes over Piastri’s.

When asked about the theory ahead of this weekend’s São Paulo Grand Prix, Piastri laughed and said: “Easy first question.”

He then made clear that he does not believe there is any bias within the team.

“No, it’s not the case [that there’s favouritism],” Piastri said. “You know, I think the last couple of weekends have been a little bit more tricky, but we’ve got pretty clear answers on why that’s the case. There’s not really too many mysteries on what’s kind of happened. I think there’s some questions of kind of why some differences have cropped up in terms of how I need to drive and stuff like that, but there’s, yeah, everything is explainable.

“So there’s definitely none of that going on.”

The 23-year-old enters the Brazilian round trailing Norris for the first time since April’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix but said he has not changed his mindset.

“Not massively, I don’t think, you know, especially when it’s essentially even,” he said. “It doesn’t change a whole lot, but for me the mindset all year has been about trying to just have the best weekends I can and ultimately drive as fast as I can.

“You know, at no point through the weekend have I kind of factored in more than normal. My risk-taking approach or anything like that. So I think for me that doesn’t change anything now that the championship order is a bit different, but yeah, I’ll be trying to just go as fast as I can and take the same risks that I normally do because it’s like nine times out of ten, that’s a good balance to have.

“And as you said in terms of technical struggles, everything’s explainable, but are there kind of other factors external to the pure craft that have played a part in some of the struggles recently, going back to Baku, of course you had a run where three out of four weekends were a bit tricky.”

Piastri’s downturn has coincided with a difficult stretch on track. After Monza, he crashed out of both qualifying and the race in Baku, was forced off the track by Norris at the start in Singapore, and then failed to reach the podium in Austin or Mexico as Norris finished second and first respectively. The pair also collided during the Austin sprint race.

Reflecting on that run, Piastri said: “I think Baku was obviously a bad weekend, but for extremely different reasons … It was just a messy weekend from start to finish, but ultimately the pace was pretty good, I was just trying a bit too hard.

“Austin and Mexico were quite different in that I actually feel like I’ve executed reasonably well, but the lap time has just been not there and I think we’ve got some kind of evidence as to why it’s not been there, but I think the question as to why some things have not been working in the last couple of weekends and why some things have been, that part I’m not sure we’ll ever know the answer to.

“Knowing that there’s a difference is the biggest thing. So I don’t think, you know, Baku you could argue yes, there was some other things that may be corrected, but I think in Mexico and Austin it’s just been about lacking performance and trying to find out where to find it.”

Piastri enters the São Paulo weekend determined to regain his form over the remaining rounds and end his season on a high, brushing aside any notion of internal politics.