F1 world champ doubles down on Aussie vendetta, labels Piastri ‘sneaky’
Oscar Piastri is leading the F1 championship race, but a former champ has doubled down on his vendetta against Aussie drivers.
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F1 world champion Jacques Villeneuve has doubled down on his claim that Oscar Piastri pushed Lando Norris off the track at the Canadian Grand Prix, describing the Aussie’s driving style as “sneaky”.
The teammates came together in wheel to wheel action for the first time in Montreal earlier this month, with Norris crashing out after going for a gap along the pit straight that wasn’t there.
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The DNF allowed Piastri to open up a slender 22-point lead in the standings over his teammate after 10 races, with Max Verstappen 43 points behind the Australian.
Norris apologised for the crash but Villeneuve went against the grain, saying Piastri wasn’t completely without blame for the incident.
“He realised too late that Piastri was moving towards the left because he had his nose in the gearbox of Piastri, he didn’t realise it and Piastri was edging gradually towards the left,” Villeneuve said after the race in Canada.
“He’s not supposed to be doing that, it was a little bit nasty, so there will be some talks later inside the team.”
Now Villeneuve has doubled down on his comments, describing Piastri’s drifting to the left of the track to block a potential Norris overtake as “sneaky”.
Speaking to BetVictor, Villeneuve said: “Was that a clever move from Lando? No, it wasn’t. Even though he had the right to go there, it was wrong because he ended up crashing and he should have expected that Piastri would ease to the left continuously.
“It’s the same thing. If you cross at a green light, and a car runs you over, it doesn’t matter that you were right to cross. You still don’t want to get run over.
“That is where Lando was wrong, but not according to the rules. He should have read the situation much better.
“As he is fighting for the championship my guess was that he wanted to get (Mercedes rookie Kimi) Antonelli as well. He had a lot of speed and Lando would have overtaken Oscar the next lap or the one after, but would have missed Antonelli. That is why he went so quickly.
“It is easy for us on the outside with the outside camera like a video game to see that there was no room. You have to put yourself in the driver’s perspective.
“He couldn’t see that he was gradually going towards the left and that he was going to run out of road. And you can hear it. As soon as he pulled out, you can hear him lift it from the gas. It’s too late.
“So, he really misjudged it. Piastri did it very cleverly because he was gradually moving towards the left, more than on any other lap. So, he was gradually pushing him off, but in such a gentle manner that it looks like he didn’t do it on purpose.
“Some drivers are amazing at that and Oscar has got that going for him. And it might give him the championship.”
The Piastri-Norris incident drew comparisons to a similar crash between McLaren teammates at the 2012 Canadian Grand Prix, although Jenson Button clearly shunted Lewis Hamilton into the wall.
“Lando should have seen it coming,” Villeneuve continued.
“The regulations say a driver cannot push a person or block a person off the track. But when a person is arriving at speed pulling out of a tow, it is too late to start moving when the person is already inches behind you.
“That happens too often in F1 now and it never gets penalised.
“When he (Norris) got in the tow he wasn’t sure where Piastri would go and he wanted to be on the inside for the braking. I guess he didn’t realise that he was so close to the edge of the track and also, the track then starts turning to the right. It was a big misjudgment from Lando.
“But then do you want to purely follow the rules? Do you want to purely follow the logic? It depends what you want to do. But ultimately, he was wrong to put his nose there, but that’s not necessarily according to the rules. It’s two separate things. That’s where my comment came from.”
Villeneuve believes Norris is struggling racing Piastri, with the Aussie proving difficult to pass on track.
“He was better off against Max than Oscar, his teammate, for some reason,” he said.
“He is having a harder time dealing with the pressure from his teammate because they are in the same car.
“Piastri is sneaky, whilst Max is just aggressive. That’s very different. And he’s having a much harder time judging the sneakiness. But Norris still has the pace over Piastri, but Piastri is playing the game a little bit better.”
With Piastri’s 22-point lead less than the 25 points awarded for a race win, Villeneuve said Norris is still very much in the title race.
“Lando has got the pace, but Oscar is better at handling the game under pressure,” he said.
“Piastri knows he has the upper hand, he knows he can play the game better. And that’s important when you want a championship. But he still needs to get a couple of tenths, he still needs to get that ultimate pace. So maybe that confidence will help him get there now.”
“Who knows which way it will go during the season? Things might change. Because once you end up leading the championship for a while, you don’t drive the same way anyway.
“So maybe Piastri will start making the mistakes that Lando was making early in the season when he was the championship favourite. Psychologically, things change.”
Villeneuve’s scathing Ricciardo takedown
You would be forgiven for thinking Villeneuve who was once engaged to Dannii Minogue, has a vendetta against Australian drivers after he said Daniel Ricciardo was only on the grid because of his fame.
His comments about Piastri come after whacking Jack Doohan following his crash in practice in Japan earlier this year, as well as his long-running feud with Ricciardo.
Things got ‘personal’ between Villeneuve and Ricciardo at last year’s Canadian Grand Prix when the 54-year-old responded to a question on Sky Sports during Friday practice about Ricciardo’s future, by asking “Why is he still in F1?”.
Villeneuve went onto torch Ricciardo’s whole career even more harshly.
“He was beating a (Sebastian) Vettel that was burnt out, that was trying to invent things with the car to go win and just making a mess of his weekends,” he said.
“Then he was beating for half a season (Max) Verstappen when Verstappen was 18 years old, just starting.
“Then that was it. He stopped beating anyone after that.
“I think his image has kept him in F1 more than his actual results.”
After qualifying in fifth that week, Ricciardo then told ESPN that Villeneuve was “talking s***”.
Coincidentally, Piastri is aiming to become the first non European driver to win the championship since Canada’s Villeneuve won in 1997.
Piastri is aiming to become just the third Aussie to win a F1 drivers championship and the first since Alan Jones back in 1980.
Piastri’s assuredness behind the wheel and consistency in results has F1 greats suggesting McLaren will back the Aussie as the “main man” and the team’s top hope for the drivers’ championship this year.
In just his third F1 season, Piastri has seven race wins and can equal Ricciardo’s career haul of eight victories if he salutes this weekend in Austria, which is a home race for Red Bull.
Watch the Austrian Grand Prix this weekend on Kayo Sports, with the main race on Sunday at 11pm AEST.
— With Foxsports.com.au
Originally published as F1 world champ doubles down on Aussie vendetta, labels Piastri ‘sneaky’
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