Oscar Piastri Searches for Answers After an ‘Anonymous’ Weekend Leaves Him Trailing Lando Norris

• Oscar Piastri produced what F1 Nation pundits called one of the most anonymous weekends of his season at the Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid
• Lando Norris has outscored his McLaren teammate by 66 points in 2026 as the gap between them keeps growing
• Baku is the circuit where Piastri won his second career race in 2024, and pundit Jolyon Palmer says he is still capable of victory there

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The Gap to Norris Has Become the Real Story of Piastri’s Season

Oscar Piastri arrives at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix with more questions than answers about his form, after what F1 Nation pundits James Hinchcliffe and Jolyon Palmer described as one of the most anonymous weekends of his season at the Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid.

Piastri finished the inaugural Madring race in eighth place, in what he himself called a “painful” drive, while teammate Lando Norris took pole position. Norris has now outscored Piastri by 66 points in the 2026 championship.

A Rough History With Baku

Piastri’s relationship with the Baku City Circuit has not always been smooth. His 2025 title challenge unraveled after a scrappy weekend at that year’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix, when he qualified ninth, jumped the start, triggered anti-stall and dropped to the back of the field before crashing into the barriers on the opening lap. Norris and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen capitalized from that point onward, and Piastri slipped to third in the final 2025 standings.

He was given the chance to put that disappointment behind him over the winter and prepare for a new set of regulations in 2026, but any hope of another title run was overtaken early in the year by Mercedes’ dominance, and more recently by his own teammate’s resurgence.

‘One of the Most Anonymous Weekends’

Hinchcliffe broke down what went wrong in Madrid on the latest episode of F1 Nation. “He had his team mate on pole, what should’ve been pole by an obscene margin had he not nearly binned it at the final corner in Qualifying,” Hinchcliffe said.

“He was walking the race before the VSC, clearly the quickest car at the end but just couldn’t get around, and it was one of the most anonymous weekends for Oscar. He was barely mentioned. He just sort of qualified where he did, raced where he did and you didn’t really hear from him.”

Hinchcliffe said the bigger concern is not one bad weekend but a pattern that has run through the whole year. “I think it’s more about what happened last week, trying to figure out how to close that gap to Lando, what has he found? Where has this extra gear come from since we got to Hungary that we just haven’t seen Oscar able to match? It’s kind of been all season long.”

“I thought early in the year that maybe Oscar was getting on top of the rules a little bit better, but where Lando was maybe struggling to figure certain things out, he’s continued to improve, whereas it seems like Oscar hasn’t been able to continue that trajectory as Lando’s got better. It’s going to be a tough weekend for him just because that’s the current form within that team.”

Palmer: ‘He’s Capitulating This Season’

Jolyon Palmer went further, pointing out that Piastri’s struggles have escaped the scrutiny facing George Russell at Mercedes for one reason only, that McLaren is no longer fighting for the title. “Oscar can be grateful that McLaren aren’t in the championship fight in a way because otherwise we’d be looking at him in exactly the same way as we’re looking at George. He’s capitulating this season.”

Palmer set Piastri’s current form against the peak of his 2025 season, when he looked like the championship favorite for months. “Oscar had one half of a season last year where he looked like a champion and he drove like a champion. He was amazing, and bearing in mind he’s an F3 and F2 champion, it felt this time last year like the second coming of a great Aussie champion. Could he do what Mark Webber didn’t?”

Looking back over Piastri’s full career, Palmer argued the sample of truly dominant form is smaller than it appeared at the time. “It felt like it was the right thing, but when you actually look through Oscar’s career in F1, he’s had three and a half years now, half a year was amazing. Three years were basically spent as second driver to Lando.”

Baku Is Where Piastri Has Won Before

Even with that tough assessment of his season, Palmer was clear that Piastri has not lost the ability to win, and Baku carries good memories. He took his second career victory at the Baku City Circuit in 2024, and Palmer believes that pedigree has not gone anywhere. “He’s still capable now, he could turn up and win in Baku,” Palmer said. “He’s capable of great drives, but the consistency in his comparison to Lando is not there apart from that half a year last year, which was great timing because it set him up for a title tilt. That’s my question on it, is this where Oscar is at?”

Palmer also pointed to a specific mismatch between Piastri’s driving style and this generation of Formula 1 car. “He’s not as comfortable sliding the car around as Lando. I think last year, his car suited him a little bit more until we went to these low-grip tracks and we saw his limitations more in Austin and Mexico.”

A Reset Waiting at the End of the Season

Palmer’s final assessment was blunt about where Piastri’s campaign now stands. “I feel like he’s just a driver who will be hoping for a run of form, but also maybe just for next winter and a bit of a reset right now. Every weekend just feels like it’s a real struggle for him.”

McLaren’s constructors’ championship is not under threat from behind, a point Palmer made in comparing Piastri’s situation with Russell’s at Mercedes. Without the added pressure of a title fight to manage, Piastri and McLaren have room to work through the difficulties away from the level of scrutiny facing Mercedes’ second driver, but that comfort will offer little if Baku turns into another weekend where Norris pulls further clear inside their own garage.

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Written by

Jack Renn

Jack Renn is an editor at F1 Chronicle and a veteran motorsport journalist with 25 years of experience covering Formula 1 and international motorsport. A member of the Association Internationale de la Presse Sportive (AIPS), the global body representing accredited sports journalists, Jack has spent his career reporting from paddocks and press rooms across the F1 calendar. His work spans race analysis, technical insight, and in-depth features, giving readers authoritative coverage grounded in decades of firsthand experience at the highest level of the sport.

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