'That's exactly what will happen': What McLaren expects to see next after Oscar Piastri 'errors'
Updated . First published at
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella is confident that Oscar Piastri will "come back stronger" following his poor performance at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
Piastri's struggles began during a marathon qualifying session, where a crash in Q3 forced him to start from ninth place on the grid.
His weekend then culminated in another crash on the opening lap of the feature race.
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Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris of McLaren. Jayce Illman via Getty Images
The Australian jumped the race start before stalling on the grid, which caused him to fall to the back of the pack before the opening corner.
His race ended soon after, when he locked up and crashed at turn five. He was the only driver to retire from the grand prix.
Piastri was handed a five-second penalty for the jump start. However, the penalty will not carry over to the next race in Singapore despite not having been served.
Speaking after the race, Stella highlighted Piastri's strong record in other racing categories, suggesting the 24-year-old can bounce back and learn from his mistakes quickly.
"These errors that we've seen on Oscar's side, they are definitely uncharacteristic," he said.
"Oscar has been the most solid driver in the 2025 campaign so far, and from what I could see, even with multi-champion drivers, sometimes you have a weekend in which it's all about learning."
Oscar Piastri climbs out of his damaged McLaren after crashing during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Getty
Stella believed Piastri's comedy of errors was a result of an "excess of eagerness" and a misjudgement of grip.
"I think Oscar concentrated [on] some learning opportunities this weekend, despite his will," he said.
"[At] the start, I think it's just an excess of eagerness. I'm sure we have seen this now, and we won't see this anymore.
"In terms of the lock-up, similar to [qualifying], he just misjudged the level of tyre grip available. Perhaps this was compounded by a slow start, with a false start. We don't know yet.
"But I think one of the strongest features of Oscar is how rapidly he learns, how rapidly he improves, and now he can come back stronger. That's why he's been so successful in every category, and I think that's exactly what will happen in his Formula 1 career, and we will see it in the remainder of the season."
Oscar Piastri watches on after crashing out. Getty
On the other side of the garage, Piastri's teammate, Lando Norris, also had a difficult weekend in Baku.
Norris had a golden opportunity to gain ground in the pair's championship battle, but the Briton could only manage a seventh-place finish, narrowing the lead by six points to bring the gap to 25.
In qualifying, Norris failed to capitalise on Piastri's crash, managing only the seventh-fastest time after clipping the wall on his final flying lap.
His race was then hampered by a slow pit stop and heavy traffic, leaving him stuck behind Red Bull's Yuki Tsunoda and Racing Bulls' Liam Lawson despite a long stint on his medium tyres.
Norris denied that he wasted Piastri's retirement.
With Norris struggling to move up the field, Stella felt his car did not have the pace to gain any further positions.
Lando Norris fields questions from reporters in the media pen following the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Jayce Illman via Getty Images
"I think on Lando's side, we were hoping to have a car that was in condition to overtake, in fairness, but the reality is that the car wasn't fast enough to stay close to the car ahead out of the last corner to then be able to overtake down the straight," he said.
"This means that Lando spent the entire race in traffic, despite feeling that the car had more to offer.
"These kinds of circuits don't seem to suit our car very well in terms of its strengths, but at the same time, definitely, there was more available in the car than in qualifying and in the race, we did not exploit."
Stella conceded that the team needed to do more to help Norris, noting that a faster pit stop could have given him a chance to get past Lawson.
With the end of the season in sight, he acknowledged that pit stops are a key area that the team needs to improve on.
"We need to keep working, because there's some important performance that is available through pit stops, and we have seen that the racing, if anything, is getting tighter and tighter," he said.
"So what is the impact of a pit stop now? It gets more and more important.
"So definitely, for the remainder of the season, and also thinking about next year's car, there's work to do."
The title fight continues at the Singapore Grand Prix on October 5.
