Were the lengths McLaren went to prise Oscar Piastri from Alpine’s grasp last year justified by his performance for them as a rookie this year?
This is not a question which requires answer in essay form: Yes, he did. Spectacularly so.
The combination of Lando Norris’ speed and the particular handling characteristics of the McLaren had proved too much for Piastri’s predecessor. Daniel Ricciardo was shown the door a year early after it became clear he wasn’t going to be able to get on terms with his team mate.
Piastri was on the wrong side of the 15-7 scoreline between him and Norris, which matched the better of Ricciardo’s two seasons at the team. With a year’s experience behind him better thing will be expected next year. Norris, by his own, repeated and self-flagellating admissions, made a few costly errors during qualifying sessions this year, notably at the finale in Yas Marina. Having a first-year team mate increasingly breathing down his next can’t have helped matters.
With Piastri often qualifying close to Norris and sometimes ahead of him, the team often had to manage interactions between their drivers on race day. As Piastri hasn’t yet mastered the technique of keeping his rubber alive as long as Norris, this occasionally meant the team chose to manoeuvre Norris ahead. This was occasionally done on-track, but at other times he was given a preferential pit stop before his team mate to get him ahead. At Monza this led to a perilously close moment between the pair at the Rettifilo.
That aside the pair seldom compromised each other, aside from the freak circumstances in Jeddah, where Norris hit debris shed by his team mate’s car.
While Piastri ended his first season with less than half his team mate’s points score, that figure deserves some context. Not only were many circuits unfamiliar to Piastri, but Norris also got his hands on McLaren’s two game-changing upgrades before his team mate, in Austria and Singapore.
Over the second half of the season, Piastri actually out-qualified Norris 6-5. During that time he scored McLaren’s sole victory of the season, albeit only in a sprint race, at Losail International Circuit. A more experienced Piastri will surely be an even more potent threat to Norris next year, and given the progress McLaren made this season they could even emerge as the closest challengers to Red Bull.
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