Oscar Piastri has struggled to match his title rival and McLaren team-mate Lando Norris in recent weeks because he was “already at his limit,” according to 1997 Formula 1 world champion Jacques Villeneuve.
Piastri appeared to be heading towards a maiden Drivers’ Championship when he won the Dutch Grand Prix in late August to score his seventh victory of the opening 15 rounds and move 34 points clear of Norris.
However, the 24-year-old Australian hasn’t won in the five races since then, and his failure to even make the podium at the last four allowed Norris to reclaim the championship lead for the first time since April with a dominant win at the Mexico City Grand Prix.
With four rounds remaining, starting with this weekend’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix, Villeneuve is unsure whether Piastri will be able to find the form to overturn his one-point deficit.
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Highlights of the Mexico City Grand Prix
“We didn’t have an extremely fantastic Lando early in the season, not the Lando we had at the end of last year,” Villeneuve told Sky Sports’ The F1 Show. “And we kept saying, ‘oh, that’s because Piastri has stepped up, he’s now on Lando’s pace and even quicker.’
“But was it actually Piastri stepping up or Lando that just wasn’t on it? He kept saying he wasn’t very comfortable with the car. And maybe that made Piastri complacent a bit. When all you have to fight is your team-mate, maybe you don’t push to that last limit, that last tenth of a second.
“Suddenly, we get Baku and we get Max winning everything. And Lando stepped up. Lando is driving faster and better than he’s been all season.
“Piastri is not stepping up. He was already at his limit. And when you do that, when you have to go that extra two tenths, and suddenly, you find problems in the cars that did not exist.”
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McLaren’s Oscar Piastri had a disastrous first lap at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, crashing out of the race after hitting the wall
The commanding lead Piastri built earlier in the season was based upon consistency, but errors have crept into his driving in recent weeks.
Piastri crashed out of both qualifying and the race in Azerbaijan, and also attempted an overtake that took he and Norris out of the Sprint in Austin.
Villeneuve added: “When you drive within the limit, the car is perfect. It’s easy, you drive, you save your tires. And suddenly, you have to go a couple of tenths faster. You can’t drive the car anymore. Everything is wrong. You don’t know why.
“The McLaren car hasn’t evolved that much, so there’s no reason for it to be driven differently. Same tyres, they don’t change. Sometimes they’re softer, sometimes they’re not. The track is warmer and so on, but there isn’t that big of a difference.
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Watch back the most controversial moments between team-mates Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri
“It just takes your team-mate to step up a little bit. And you’re realising, ‘oh, how do I do that?’ And suddenly, you drive tensed up, nothing works, and that’s it. It gets in your head. And you just get slower and slower and slower, and you start inventing setups that don’t exist.
“You start doubting your way of driving. You look at the data and you say, ‘oh, my team-mate is one tenth quicker in that corner, I need to drive differently.’ And that’s when it goes wrong. You have to remember what you were doing that was good and just step up a little bit.”
Brundle: Baku crashes sent Piastri off the rails
After the opening race of the season, at which a spin in the wet saw Piastri go from contention for victory to finishing ninth, the Australian was in the top 4 at the next 15 races, only twice missing the podium.
The Baku weekend, at which he twice crashed and also jumped the start, ended that streak. He has since finished fourth in Singapore, before taking fifth in both Austin and Mexico City.
Sky Sports F1’s Martin Brundle believes Piastri has failed to fully recover from his Baku struggles.
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Martin Brundle discusses the Formula One championship favourites
“Baku would have scattered his brain,” Brundle told Sky Sports’ The F1 Show. “That was a very difficult weekend for him with twice in the barriers and the jump start and it seems to have gone off the rails.
“Something’s happened in Oscar’s head. Have we seen any signs of this before in his previous junior racing or Formula 1 seasons? That’s worth looking into.
“But something’s just gone wrong and he’s lost a bit of confidence. And the way these cars go into corners and how close the competition is at the moment, you only need to be a touch off.
“He needs a very solid weekend. Has he got a lot going on in his ears? We described him as horizontal for pretty much all the season because that’s how he looked. He always has been so calm on the radio, not letting things get to him. And suddenly, that glass ceiling, that facade, whatever it is, seems to have gone from him and he’s struggling.”
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Oscar Piastri admits responsibility for the US Sprint crash and it now being a ‘clean slate’ between the McLaren team-mates for the Mexico City GP
Brundle dismissed the idea that McLaren have any preference in terms of which of their drivers wins the title, insisting the team will be desperate for Piastri to return to form.
“Rest assured, a team doesn’t spend $400m a year and have 1,500 employees and try to make one of their cars go a little bit more slowly.
“Everybody associated with Oscar’s car will want to turn that around soon, as in Brazil.
“His wins earlier on in the season, his season early doors was so astonishing, you don’t suddenly forget how to do that.”
Formula 1’s thrilling title race continues in Brazil with a Sprint weekend at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix from this Friday, live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports with NOW – no contract, cancel anytime
