Oscar Piastri has arguably had the best rookie season this year among all the debutants that joined F1 this campaign. The Australian has taken McLaren teammate Lando Norris to the limit by challenging the Briton during both qualifying and the race on several occasions. In stark contrast, Williams’ Logan Sargeant has struggled massively to match experienced teammate Alex Albon. Meanwhile, Nyck de Vries already got the AlphaTauri sack after failing to meet expectations. It is for this reason that Norris has told total-motorsport.com in an interview that Piastri has been one of the best rookies to enter F1.
Piastri has been so impressive this season that it has also made McLaren uncomfortable with strategy. The team were tested last week when the Australian had a nervy moment with Norris at the Italian Grand Prix.
Since the two McLarens made contact, it prompted team principal Andrea Stella to state (as quoted by the-race.com), “There should never, ever, be contact between two McLaren cars“. With the 22-year-old having been so impressive, Norris has recently taken credit for the same.
Lando Norris explains how he has helped Oscar Piastri
In a recent interview with total-motorsport.com, Lando Norris was asked to comment on how impressive Oscar Piastri has been this season. In reply, the Briton explained how he has played a vital role in helping the Australian to have one of the best rookie seasons in F1 arguably.
“I obviously played a huge role, no? He’s developed a decent amount but he started off on probably one of the best baselines a rookie’s ever started off on coming into F1. So I think he’s made a good amount of development, but the better thing is just how he started from the first race weekend itself“, explained Norris.
After stating the same, the 23-year-old did admit that Piastri would be able to give a better response about how much of a part he played in helping the Australian achieve success this season. Norris believes that he played a part because Piastri gets the opportunity to look at his data every weekend.
Hence, with Piastri having been so impressive, F1 experts have also analyzed whether the Australian has the potential to threaten Norris and make the Briton feel uncomfortable.
Palmer believes “Norris is feeling the heat“
While speaking to the BBC (as quoted by mirror.co.uk), Jolyon Palmer explained how Lando “Norris is feeling the heat” this season with Oscar Piastri as his teammate. While the former Renault driver still believes that Norris is still McLaren’s number one driver, he does believe that the Australian has done a fine job of threatening the Briton’s position in the team.
However, it is pertinent to note that there is still a decent gap between the two teammates in the championship. As things stand, Norris is currently eighth in the championship with 79 points and has scored 43 more points than 12th-placed Piastri.
