Oscar Piastri hints McLaren strategy may have cost him the chance to take the 2025 Austrian GP victory away from Lando Norris, as he hints a poor strategic call left him with too much of a gap to make up on June 29.
The championship leader began Sunday’s race from third on the grid and was tasked with overtaking his teammate if he hoped to extend the gap at the summit of the drivers’ standings.
And after picking off Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc for second place at the very first corner of the very first lap, he immediately set about that challenge as the 24-year-old got into DRS and frantically looked for a way past.
He tried in Turn 3 and Turn 4 but the leader’s defence held firm as the Brit showed excellent awareness to read the picture and cover corners off appropriately, and the Australian’s charge ended with a lock-up that almost saw him wipe the 25-year-old out.
Norris then pitted at the end of that same lap whilst Piastri continued to obtain a tyre advantage for a second charge, however, he hints this McLaren strategy may have cost him victory at the 2025 Austrian GP.
“After the first stop, maybe we didn’t do the right thing giving Lando some breathing room,” Piastri told the media, including Total-Motorsport.com. “But the first 20 laps were pretty intense. So, it was a good battle.”
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Piastri continued: “I knew that I was always going to be pitting second in that scenario. For me, it felt like if I couldn’t stay within DRS, then getting back inside one second was going to be very, very tough.
“So, I kind of wanted to go a bit different and give myself some fresher tyres and hopefully be able to use them at the end of the stint. It didn’t really pan out that way, unfortunately, but that was the thinking at least.
“We’ll go back and look and see whether that was the right thing to do. In the moment, I was always going to lose some amount of time by pitting a lap later, so I kind of went, why not try something a bit different?”
Norris reacts to Piastri battle at 2025 Austrian GP
From Norris’ point of view, the 70 laps at the Red Bull Ring proved to be a tough test of his mental fortitude as Piastri showed the trademark Aussie grit that would have made his manager, Mark Webber, proud.
Yet the man from Bristol displayed no cracks in his psyche and expertly covered off his lines and bases to make sure he never lost the lead, outside of pit-stops, in an excellent error-free display that gives him momentum into the British GP from July 4-6.
So how does he feel about that battle with his teammate, as he proves their collision in Canada truly was an unfortunate one off; and critically proves he can beat the championship leader?
“Crossing the line at the end. That was the best bit,” Norris added to media, including Total-Motorsport.com. “But there was plenty of fun along the way, with Oscar, in the first stint especially.
“Some close moments, some good battles. Just a lot of laps of looking in my mirrors out of Turn 1 and all the way down to Turn 3. Stressful for sure, not the most comfortable position to be in, but it was a good battle between us.
“And then quite a long race from that point onwards because I never had a lovely gap, and Oscar kept coming at me the next two stints. So, yeah, good fun, but a tricky race, but well managed.
