Oscar Piastri has admitted that his own chances of clinching the Formula 1 Drivers’ Championship in 2024 are “not realistic” despite his impressive recent points run.
Piastri continued his rapid improvement in his sophomore season with a calculated driver under immense pressure in Azerbaijan to seize his second career win in F1.
The Australian completed a brave lunge on Charles Leclerc into Turn 1 on Lap 20 to claim the lead and then resisted the Ferrari driver’s repeated advances to triumph.
Piastri has conceded the circumstances behind the success made it more rewarding than his maiden win in Hungary, where team orders overshadowed the occasion.
Asked whether he considered Baku to be more special than his win at the Hungaroring, Piastri told media including Motorsport Week: “I would say definitely.
“I think just the amount of hard work and pressure that I was under in Baku made it much sweeter.
“I think Hungary was definitely special, don’t get me wrong, but I think, in any kind of race where you have to work so hard for such a long part of the race…
“I think I said last week, I’ve kind of had one race win like that in my career.
“And until Baku, you know, it wasn’t necessarily my most dominant performance or my best performance, but it’s always the most exciting one.
“I think now Baku takes the cake for that. But, yeah, the emotion after Baku was special for different reasons compared to Hungary.”
Piastri has expressed that he is striving to maintain his gathering momentum into this weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix as he anticipates McLaren will be quick again.
“It is a nice confidence boost, definitely,” he said. “I think, you know, it’s similar in some ways, but very, very different in a lot of others.
“I think we should be competitive this weekend.
“I think the biggest thing I took from last weekend was just the execution of the race from myself and from the whole team.
“Because, you know, I don’t think it was our most competitive track of the year. I think we’ve definitely had a couple more races where we’ve been… Using a bit of electricity.
“There’s been a couple of other races where we’ve been quicker than that relative to the competition.
“So to be able to pull off a win like that when Ferrari especially was so competitive was a nice confidence boost, definitely.”
Piastri not thinking about F1 title push
Piastri’s return to the top step in Baku continued a points-scoring run which has seen him accumulate the most points on the entire grid over the previous five rounds.
With Red Bull’s troubles seeing Max Verstappen trail home in a distant fifth place last weekend, Piastri has closed to 91 points behind the Dutchman in the standings.
However, Piastri, who is 32 points down on second-place team-mate Lando Norris, has acknowledged that it will be a long shot to overturn such gaps in seven events.
Pressed on whether he had given the championship this season a deep thought, Piastri responded: “Honestly, not much.
“I think for me, maintaining the lead in the Constructors’ Championship now is by far a bigger target.
“I’m not out of the running for the Drivers’ Championship, but I think now on average, I need to score, like, it’s over 10 points more per weekend than Max, I think.
“So, I can try and go out and win every race, but it’s now at the point where I need other things to start happening to win that.
“And for that to happen for seven races in a row is not very realistic.
“Of course, I’ll try and go into every weekend trying to get the best result I can and if the picture starts to look a bit brighter, then that’s a bonus.
“But, I’m certainly under no illusion that I’m well and truly in the fight for the championship. It’s more if some crazy stuff happens, then I’ll be there to work my way into the fight.”
