Oscar Piastri has been advised to adopt a selfish kickback towards McLaren’s ‘team first’ principles this year by a former Formula 1 World Champion.
The Australian squandered a 34-point lead – earned by August – and eventually finished third in the standings to eventual champion and team-mate Lando Norris, and Max Verstappen.
Piastri was also caught up in the team’s strong leaning towards equal treatment of both drivers, which, in some instances, went against him.
At Monza, Piastri was asked to give up second place to Norris by the Woking-based squad‘s pit wall, who had lost the position due to a botched pit stop.
There were also other moments of human error which also contributed to his eventual failure to capture the title, namely at the penultimate round in Qatar.
With a Safety Car deployed early on, both he and Norris were kept out, with Verstappen pitting, amid the mandatory 25-lap maximum on one set of tyres.
It cost Piastri victory, with Verstappen claiming the win, and with it, the chance to win the championship at the final round in Abu Dhabi.
Speaking on the Drive to Wynn podcast, 1996 World Champion Damon Hill conveyed sympathy with Piastri for both those incidents.
“I think he probably felt the worst he was going to feel after Qatar, I think he could not believe what had happened there,” he said.
“He had some misfortune, you have to say, and he’s lost out because of some decisions with McLaren, trying to be fair. For example, Lando had a bad pit stop at Monza, and he was asked to give the place back.
“Wow, that’s quite a big thing to do, isn’t it, to give points away to a guy you could be fighting for the World Championship for?
“He will probably look at that and go, ‘Well, maybe I won’t do that again’.”
Oscar Piastri has to ‘think of himself’ to stand best chance of F1 title success
Hill won the Drivers’ title with his Williams team adopting an approach of equality between himself and team-mate Jacques Villeneuve, having previously been deployed as a ‘number two’ to Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna.
The 65-year-old offered Piastri the advice of doing it utmost to sideswipe the ‘papaya rules’ attitude at McLaren and focus on himself amid Norris’ defence of his title in 2026.
“Next year, if I were him, I’d be coming back saying, ‘Listen, I love the team, and it’s been great, but I have to think of myself’,” Hill continued.
“‘It’s my career. If the situation arises and you ask me to return points to my team-mate, you have to ask yourself, why would I do that?’
“‘I can’t afford to do that. I did it last year. That could have cost me the World Championship’.”
READ MORE – Ex-F1 star offers ‘no sympathy’ to Oscar Piastri for 2025 title defeat
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