Oscar Piastri’s rise to the front of the Formula 1 field and F1 2025 success has not been down to one big breakthrough, but rather a series of fine-tuned improvements that have elevated the McLaren star into a genuine championship contender.
With four wins from the opening six races, Piastri leads the drivers’ standings and looks increasingly comfortable at the front of the grid. Rather than a radical overhaul, the 23-year-old credits his performance gains to an incremental approach.
“Trying to find little bits everywhere,” Piastri explained ahead of the 2025 Emilia Romagna GP at Imola. “It’s quite a different feeling when you win a race because you feel like you’ve just gotten by or had good circumstances.
“But to now be winning because we have an incredibly quick car and I feel like I’m driving well, that’s very satisfying.”
A faster driver, a sharper mind
According to Andrea Stella, team principal at McLaren, the real turning point for Piastri has been a fundamental gain in speed. And that, in turn, has opened the door to improvements in all other areas.
“Well, I think the most important improvement, if anything, is that Oscar has become a faster driver,” said Stella.
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“When you’re a faster driver, then you have more opportunity to process… more bandwidth to process things. This is true when you are in the car, and this is also true when you are outside the car.”
This increased mental capacity has allowed Piastri to work more efficiently with his engineers, focusing on the finer details rather than large-scale fixes.
As the Australian noted, the preparation routine has not changed dramatically – the difference lies in its quality and focus.
“It’s just been about how you do things more efficiently,” Piastri said. “Experience naturally helps.
“Some of the things that you have to concentrate on become more natural. But the preparation has mostly been the same. We’ve just been trying to find those little bits in every column.”
Within McLaren, insiders point out that Piastri was already operating at a high level when he arrived in 2023.
While observers focused on narrowing the qualifying and tyre management gap to Lando Norris, the internal assessment was that the difference between the two was marginal – and the capacity Piastri has to analyse and adapt was exceptional and led to F1 2025 success.
Stella also highlighted the impact of Piastri’s support network, including his engineers and his manager, former F1 race winner Mark Webber.
“Over the winter, there’s been a very specific amount of work that has paid attention to different areas,” said Stella. “Oscar is definitely the main one to praise… but I’d like to mention the team around Oscar.
“His engineers, all the support from the factory… and Mark Webber, who is definitely a great source of thoughts, insight, and identification of opportunities.”
That collective effort, paired with Piastri’s relentless drive to extract every last bit of performance, has created a virtuous circle.
Faster driving leads to better understanding, which in turn enables even more speed – a cycle that could carry Piastri to his first world title in just his third F1 season.
