Martin Brundle has shed light on the incidents that befell Oscar Piastri in Formula 1‘s Hungarian Grand Prix, conceding the Australian has been without any sort of “lucky break” recently.
This time a year ago, Piastri was riding the crest of a wave that he could have found on the beaches in his homeland, leading the Drivers’ Championship by a considerable margin from teammate Lando Norris.
But after winning the Dutch Grand Prix, his season began to unravel through a multitude of incidents, including some fraught intra-team moments pertaining to McLaren’s infamous ‘papaya rules’.
It was most certainly a case of opportunity missed for Piastri, going on to lose the title to Norris, and finishing third behind a resurgent Max Verstappen, who had been over 100 points behind Piastri a handful of races earlier.
2026 has not got off to the greatest of starts, either, which began with crashing out on his exploration lap before taking to the grid in front of his home fans in Melbourne.
Another DNS followed in China, and despite picking up a podium in Japan, he enters the summer break 136 points behind Norris, who took his and McLaren’s first victory of the season in Hungary last time out.
This was most certainly another moment missed, with further circumstances destroying his race and chance of victory, which was confirmed with transmission failure with Norris already back out in front.
Writing in his Sky Sports F1 column, Brundle identified the crucial moment where, had his car not broken down, the race was lost regardless.
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“It was the second round of stops on this high tyre wear circuit that made the difference,” he wrote.
“Piastri pitted on Lap 33 again to cover [Lewis] Hamilton on fresh tyres, and then Norris had his chance to prove he was indeed faster by running hard and pitting on Lap 39, giving him a decent tyre life offset to his teammate Piastri.
“On that same Lap 39, Piastri was coming up to lap Carlos Sainz’s Williams who was having his own battle with fellow countryman Fernando Alonso, and after running wide in the infamous Turn 2 which had given Piastri the lead on the opening lap, and which must have looked for all the world to Piastri that he’d seen him and was letting him through, just as Sainz swung heavily back to the racing line and clashed with the race leader.
“Sainz had been informed by his Williams team but his position on the outside of a 180 degree turn meant he had no mirror sight of Piastri tight on the inside, and so his penalty was mitigated down to five seconds, which was zero comfort to a rightly angry Piastri.”
“Piastri did well not to spin out but he lost crucial time and Norris would emerge from the pits into a lead he would not relinquish. In fact, he would relentlessly increase it despite a third stop under a Virtual Safety Car for fresher soft compound tyres on Lap 56 to recover, so painfully, Piastri’s McLaren which had suffered transmission failure.
“The young Australian hasn’t been able to catch any kind of lucky break for the best part of a year now.”
Piastri will be hoping for another dose of Dutch courage in Zandvoort, where F1 ends its summer break later this month. And with McLaren appearing to be fully back to winning ways, who would bet against him taking victory again?
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