McLaren’s Formula 1 boss Andrea Stella reckons Oscar Piastri has gone “a long way forward” in developing his race management and believes there’s more to come.
The Italian lavished praise on Piastri’s progress in regard to tyre management, one of the weaknesses that held the Australian back during his rookie campaign in F1.
Following a strong performance from McLaren, finishing the race with Lando Norris in third and Piastri in fourth during the Australian Grand Prix, Stella believes the Formula 2 champion had “very good” execution despite the high amount of tyre graining during the race.
“Even compared to last year in Australia, or even Japan, and other places at the start of the season, we’ve gone a long way forward,” he explained.
“It’s extremely encouraging to think that this is only coming at the start of the second season.
“When he was driving the tyres around, I think he was feeling that if you overdo the front tyre a little bit, then the tyres are not going to be happy from a graining point of view,” revealed Stella
Stella also highlighted Piastri’s great awareness of his potential vulnerabilities going into a race weekend and his ability to identify solutions to fix those weak points.
“When I talk about adapting, is not adapting to when a problem starts. This is adapting to prevent the problem to start,” said Stella.
“You sort have to understand from the context that, ‘Oh, this context would lead to this problem’ before the problem actually manifests itself.
“When you are a rookie, you need to sort of lead into the problem and then realise how you got there.
“So, I think that’s the mechanism where he is now much more aware that some conditions will lead to some problems.
“It’s a fine-tuning, almost like a self-calibration exercise through experience,” he added.
Despite running in third during his home race following an undercut on Norris, McLaren used team orders to ensure the Briton finished ahead of his team-mate.
According to Stella, this call was meant to minimise the risks of a potential fight between both McLaren cars as he felt Norris overtaking Piastri was coming “naturally.”
McLaren has sustained an encouraging beginning to 2024, sitting third in the Constructors’ Standings with 55 after three rounds, with a 29-point gap over Mercedes.
This is radically different from where it was in the 2023 campaign when the papaya team only managed to accumulate 12 points amid a challenging start to the season.
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