Oscar Piastri keeps world title hopes alive with Qatar sprint victory, qualifies first
Oscar Piastri was being written off as a ‘choker’ after flailing over the South American leg of the F1 championships. But, his sprint win ahead of the Qatar Grand Prix could be the most important of his career.
Winning always has a habit of fixing everything.
Just a week ago, Oscar Piastri was being written off as some sort of loser, disqualified from the Las Vegas Grand Prix, along with his McLaren teammate Lando Norris, over a technical breach underneath their cars that was as close to being allowed as the thickness of a sheet of paper.
Worse still, social media trolls were savaging the down-to-Earth Australian for being a ‘choker’ - sport’s cruellest label - after he blew a 34-point lead in the world drivers’ championship following a wretched run of poor results and rotten luck.
The accusation was that he had forgotten how to win. Until all of a sudden he remembered again. Instantly, the narrative and the mood around him has turned around.
Piastri’s runaway victory in Sunday morning’s sprint race at the Qatar Grand Prix isn’t even close to the biggest race he’s won - or likely to win in the future - but it still ranks as one of the most important.
If nothing else, it has momentarily silenced the doubters and the haters who think Piastri doesn’t have what it takes to succeed in Formula One.
While it is true that he has struggled in the second half of the season, that’s really just in comparison to how well he drove in the first half. Still just 24 and only in his third season of F1, Piastri has been a star performer by any measure. The notion that he’ll have somehow failed if he doesn’t win the championship this year is grossly unfair.
“It’s been my best season by some margin. Maybe I wouldn’t say the last four races or so have been the best, but I think when you look at the picture as a whole, it’s been a very strong season so far,” Piastri said.
“It’s nice to be back on form this weekend as well. I feel like this has been the most complete season I’ve had.
“Clearly, there’s still a fair bit of headroom, which is frustrating at times but encouraging at times. So yeah, I think it’s been a good season, but still two more races to go.”
If admitting to a problem is the best remedy towards solving it, then Piastri is well on his way to a full recovery.
F1 drivers rarely acknowledge their own shortcomings but Piastri has been refreshingly honest and forthcoming about the reasons behind his form dip over the past two months.
While the conspiracy theorists blindly accuse McLaren of favouring Norris over Piastri, the Australian blames himself for struggling to adapt to the low-grip circuits on the recent Americas’ swing.
“I think there’s just been some races, obviously more recently, where things just haven’t clicked,” he said.
“Austin and Mexico in particular, there were still some opportunities to become a better driver all-round in terms of my driving style and how I adapt to different conditions and different needs from the car.
“I think that’s really it, to be honest.”
It’s no coincidence that the return to the Middle East, and their faster, high-grip tracks, has seen Piastri’s stocks rise again.
“For probably 90% of the season, what I’ve done has worked very well, and I think this weekend’s been one of those,” he said.
“But there’ve been certain moments through the year where I’ve realised there are still things to improve on and still ways I can get better.”
No matter what happens with the rest of this season, Piastri has every reason to look ahead with renewed belief after bouncing back to form in Qatar.
For all his troubles of late, the one thing he hasn’t lost sight of is his enjoyment of the sport or how the thrill of victory instantly wipes away negativity.
“Winning is a lot more fun than whatever the hell happened the last four or five races, that’s for sure,” he said.
“I mean, you always try and enjoy it. When you look at the bigger picture, even in the last few weeks that have been tough, I’m still driving probably the fastest car or one of the fastest cars that’s ever been in the world and doing something I love and all of that.
“Obviously if I wasn’t on pole it probably wouldn’t be quite as much fun, but it still would’ve been a pretty cool experience either way.”
‘LET’S GO BABY’: PIASTRI CLAIMS POLE IN QATAR AFTER SPRINT RACE VICTORY
Australia’s Oscar Piastri has broken free from his long form slump right in the nick of time to keep himself in the hunt to win this year’s Formula One world championship after smashing the lap record to claim pole position for Monday morning’s Qatar Grand Prix.
Just four hours after he won the Qatar sprint race for the third year in a row with a flawless drive, Piastri jumped back behind the wheel of his McLaren and claimed pole for the main race, outpacing both his English team mate Lando Norris and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, the only other remaining contender for the drivers’ title.
Returning to his brilliant best after a wretched run of bad luck over the past three months, Piastri pushed himself and his car to the absolute limit to post a final flying lap time of 1:19.387, registering a new track record at the lightning-fast Lusail International Circuit.
“Let’s go baby,” an uncharacteristically animated Piastri told his engineers over the team radio. “Good session everyone. That was mega.”
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella said Piastri had every right to feel pleased with himself.
“Oscar was perfect today,” Stella said. “It would be difficult to ask him to do a better job, and it was great to hear him so happy on his in-lap after pole position.”
It was Piastri’s sixth pole position of the year, eclipsing his manager Mark Webber’s record of five from 2010 for the most by an Australian driver in a single F1 season.
Critically for Piastri, it was his first pole since he set the pace in qualifying at the Dutch Grand Prix in late August and gives him a great chance to extend the championship battle into next weekend’s season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
“A great result to be on pole and to have won the Sprint. I’ve been able to get comfortable in the car really easily here and the pace has been mega,” Piastri said.
“Driving around here in these conditions is some of the most fun you can have in an F1 car, so it seems to have all clicked well.
“However, the big points are in the main race, so let’s see what we can do. Just got to keep focused, do what we can overnight and make sure we finish first.”
Norris can clinch the drivers’ title if he wins in Qatar but it’ll be decided in Abu Dhabi if he fails to outscore Piastri by another four points or he gets beaten by Verstappen.
Securing pole gives Piastri a huge advantage as the previous three Grands Prix at Qatar have all been won by the driver starting from the front of the grid.
Of the five previous races he has started on pole this season, Piastri has won four times and finished third on the other occasion.
“We left the car pretty much the same, very very minor tweaks here and there but everything felt great all weekend, if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.” Piastri said.
“I had a little bit of a question mark on which tyres we wanted to use because I did a quick lap on a used set in Q2 and that threw a little bit of a spanner in the works.
“We didn’t expect it to be so good, but Q3 was really good on the new (soft tyre) so very happy.”
On his chances of winning the race, Piastri said: “It will be pretty tough, with the two-stops we’re going to be pushing pretty hard the whole time. I don’t think it’s going to be as hot as a couple of years ago, so hopefully it’s not as bad as that.
“I’m expecting it to be a pretty tough race, you’re pulling an insane amount of G-force around here and multiple times a lap. It’s hard work but incredible fun.
“I will try my best, starting from the best spot so I will try and do some more of what I did today in the sprint and see what we can do.”
Norris will start alongside Piastri on the front row after he made a mistake and abandon his second hot lap after being on provisional pole.
“I just got a bit of understeer and was going to go off so I had to abort. Which was a shame, but it’s the way that it is,” Norris said.
“Oscar did a good lap and drove very well and has been driving well all weekend. Nothing to complain about, just didn’t do the lap, and still P2.
“The first couple of laps are always opportunities for everyone but after there I think it’s probably going to be pretty straightforward for everyone too.”
Verstappen qualified third, just ahead of George Russell, but was not confident of beating the McLarens because of the difficulty in overtaking on the Qatar circuit.
“At least we are P3 and starting on the second row, it creates better opportunities because we know it’s quite hard to pass around here,” .
“We will see what we can do but realistically it’s a bit tough this weekend. It has not been what I wanted it to be so far.”
PIASTRI DOMINATES QATAR SPRINT RACE TO KEEP TITLE HOPES ALIVE
Oscar Piastri broke a 90-day drought to win the Qatar Grand Prix sprint overnight and keep his world championship hopes flickering.
Starting from pole position, the Australian made a flying getaway from the front of the grid then comfortably maintained his lead throughout each of the 19 laps to take the chequered flag by almost five seconds at the Lusail International Circuit.
George Russell finished second for Mercedes while Piastri’s McLaren teammate Lando Norris crossed the line third, one spot ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, the only driver other than the McLaren pair with a mathematical chance of claiming the world championship.
“It’s been a good weekend so far,” Piastri said.
“I think everything went smoothly in the sprint so happy with how it’s been so far. Just need to keep it rolling.”
With just two Grands Prix remaining in 2025 - Monday morning’s full-length race at Qatar then next weekend’s season-ending race in Abu Dhabi - Norris leads Piastri by 22 points and Verstappen by 25 in the standings.
There are 50 points remaining but Norris remains in the box seat and can clinch the title as early as Monday if he outscores Piastri in the main race and finishes in front of Verstappen.
If he doesn’t, the title battle will go down to the last race.
Piastri only shaved two points off his deficit to Norris with his win in the Qatar sprint but the commanding nature of his performance has given the Australian a much-needed confidence boost after a rotten run of bad luck.
The Australian often performs at his best in the stifling heat of the Middle East on high-speed circuits with plenty of tyre grip.
This was his third successive win in the sprint race at Qatar and his first victory in any format since the Dutch Grand Prix in late August.
“It was nice to have some clean air again. It makes a pretty big difference,” Piastri said.
“The car’s been good so far and I feel like I’ve been able to gel with it pretty good.
“Obviously, the short part of the weekend’s over, and now the real stuff begins.
“It’s definitely a different circuit, incredibly high-speed, much higher grip surface as well.
“But I think, honestly, the last couple of weekends have not been bad in terms of pace, it’s just been mistakes or things out of our control going wrong.”
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said he was impressed by the way both of his drivers had bounced back from the disappointment of being stripped of valuable points.
“It was a strong reaction in terms of the result on track,” Stella said.
“We understood why we found ourselves in that unfortunate circumstance. I’m very proud. Our culture was tested by a hard situation.
“We emerged even stronger and aware that we have more work to do to not face those situations.”
The biggest beneficiary from the McLaren disqualification was of course Verstappen, who remains in contention for a fifth world title despite driving an inferior car.
A master of mind games on and off the track, the Dutchman took a cheeky swipe at McLaren’s policy of giving both their drivers’ an equal opportunity to win, saying he would have wrapped up the championship long before now if he had their car, a claim that drew a swift rebuke from Norris.
“Max generally has a good clue about a lot of things, but there’s also a lot of things he doesn’t have much of a clue about,” Norris said.
“It’s also Red Bull’s way of going about things, this kind of aggressive nature and, yeah, just talking nonsense a lot of the time.
“So it depends if you want to listen to it and talk about it – like you love to – or you do what we do as a team, which is just kind of keep our heads down, keep focused.
“So maybe he would have done, but he hasn’t so far, and he keeps trying.”
Originally published as Oscar Piastri keeps world title hopes alive with Qatar sprint victory, qualifies first
Join the conversation
McLaren decides on team orders for Piastri
Read more
Wild images emerge after F1 grid carnage
Read more