Oscar Piastri credited McLaren’s remarkable mid-season turnaround for him achieving “a lot of highlights” during his rookie Formula 1 campaign in 2023.
Following a stellar junior career which saw the Australian score three titles in succession as a rookie all eyes were on Piastri to see what he could do in his first F1 season.
Piastri certainly delivered – with a Sprint win in Qatar and two podium finishes in Japan and Qatar – earning him FIA Rookie of the Year Honours in a prizegiving ceremony on Friday.
Rewind the clock to post-race in the F1 season finale at Abu Dhabi and Piastri credited McLaren’s ability to take an uncompetitive MCL60 from the start of the season into a podium contender for giving him such a great rookie season.
“Yeah, it’s definitely been a great season,” Piastri said.
“A lot of highlights that I wouldn’t have been able to do without the team improving the car the way we did. So I have to give a lot of credit to them.”
Piastri also gave time to commend himself for being able to perform to the upgraded MCL60’s potential once he received the upgrades from the British Grand Prix.
“But also I guess to pat myself on the back, I had to deliver in those moments too,” the Australian added. “I think to me that’s probably the proudest moment.
“Silverstone where we rocked up with the car that was competitive, I was able to get the most out of it. Japan, not my finest race, but did enough to score my first podium.
“And Qatar – we had one opportunity really in the whole year to actually win something and we managed to take it. So yeah, for me I can be very proud of that.”
Looking at what he can improve, Piastri admitted a more consistent approach and ironing out mistakes will benefit him moving forward, a lesson he learnt en route to title glory in the junior formula.
But with McLaren proving to be a competitive package in the second half of 2023, the focus will be to hit the ground running from the get-go in 2024.
“I think we’re fully expecting next year to go into the year fighting for more or at least making our good weekends that we’ve had this year every weekend,” Piastri issued.
“But I’m sure Mercedes and Ferrari have the same idea. So we’ll try our best, definitely try and start it a lot better than we did this year.
“But for myself, I feel like I’ve got much more experience under my belt and I hope I can use that for whatever position we find ourselves in.”
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