F1 Panel: Is Oscar Piastri now the title favourite?

After letting his McLaren slide off the track on lap 44 in Melbourne and losing a lot of points, Oscar Piastri has been almost flawless since then. Two victories, in Shanghai and Bahrain, and a third place in Suzuka allowed him to regain almost everything he lost in the season opener. Piastri now sits just three points behind his team-mate and the driver who’d been tipped to win the title before the season began.

Our international team of writers assess Piastri’s chances of winning this year’s championship.

Piastri has already put his towel down on the sun lounger

In another life Oscar Piastri’s manager, Mark Webber, had a mathematical chance of being a world champion but his team preferred the driver in the other car. Webber was seven points ahead of team-mate Sebastian Vettel going into the 2010 season finale but Vettel was always Red Bull’s favoured son.

Webber never got as close to the title again and his relationship with the team soured. The lessons of this time will be informing the gameplay behind the scenes.

It helps that Oscar Piastri is a cool customer who never openly indulges in histrionics. He just quietly gets on with the job of being excellent.

Show, don’t tell: Piastri is laying out his bid for the world championship, and for McLaren to back him to do so, by nailing every session when it counts. This season the field is so close that shipping a couple of tenths to your team-mate can cost you several rows on the grid rather than just a position or two.

So far Norris is making it look difficult, while Piastri makes everything appear seamless even when he’s managing problems with the car. The Italians have a word for it: sprezzatura.

If it’s possible to waltz towards the title without making the proverbial song and dance about it, Oscar is on his way.

– Stuart Codling

Norris still makes too many mistakes

When Oscar Piastri crashed in the rain in Melbourne, he lost to Lando Norris in terms of championship points and, we thought at the time, psychologically. In reality that wasn’t the case at all. Since that mistake, the Australian has bounced back with two wins in China and Bahrain. He is now just three points off the lead and has made a very strong start to the season.

What is impressive is the composure and method with which he has responded. Where Norris’ victory in Melbourne could have marked his territory, he responded immediately. His attitude is also impressive, especially his behaviour on and off the track: Oscar Piastri is a cold-blooded driver who handles things with a poker face, without necessarily giving the impression of doing so. Cold but clinical, he made the most of his opportunities.

With a car like the MCL39, Oscar Piastri is obviously a title contender. And what he has in his favour is the room for improvement, which is a priori greater than that of Lando Norris, who has been around for a long time but still makes too many small mistakes, as he did last Sunday in Bahrain.

– Basile Davoine

Yes, and there’s more to come from Piastri

Oscar Piastri is looking so good this season that Lando Norris must be worried about what his younger and hungry team-mate is capable of in a car that clearly doesn’t suit the Brit at the moment. And while it’s true that the season is still in its early stages, it’s important to remember that the first few races of a championship can be crucial in terms of internal team battles.

Look at what happened the last time McLaren won three of the first four Grand Prix in 1998. David Coulthard had the upper hand over Mika Hakkinen the year before, but the Flying Finn beat his team-mate handily as the team started the season as the frontrunners and never looked back.

Of course, this is just an example and Piastri and Norris’ situations are different to those of the aforementioned F1 legends, but don’t forget that this is only the Aussie’s third year in the series and he will only get better as the season progresses.

We can already see that by comparing 2024 and 2025. Piastri lost 24-6 to Norris in head-to-head qualifying, including last year’s sprints. Curiously, those losses included all four circuits visited by F1 so far in ’25, but Piastri now leads the head-to-head duels 3-2, with large margins – four-tenths in sprint qualifying in China and Saturday in Bahrain – while the two losses were within a tenth.

Weekends like Sakhir will only boost Piastri’s confidence and I’m looking forward to seeing what he can do next in Saudi Arabia.

– Federico Faturos

A couple of bad weekends doesn’t mean Norris is hopeless

You’re only as good as your last race in Formula 1 – and right now, straight after the Bahrain Grand Prix, there are a lot of lingering questions about Lando Norris’ title ambitions. He’s making mistakes – and he’s quick to admit it. But while it’s easy to say he’s underperforming at the moment, you have to remember one thing. Despite all the mistakes, he’s still the only guy who’s finished all the races (excluding the sprint in China) in the top three. So even when he makes mistakes, he keeps scoring points. He’s had bad weekends, it’s true. But he still managed to finish second or third. And that’s not too bad after a bad weekend.

Piastri looks very strong and after a performance like he had in Bahrain it’s very difficult to find any weaknesses. But there will be difficult weekends for him as well. And while Norris has been on the podium four times this year, Piastri’s mistake in Melbourne – with all the discounts for tricky conditions – was more expensive. He’s not going to start dominating all of a sudden. There will be many weekends where he won’t be able to match Norris’ pace.

What the Australian has shown in the last three races is that it won’t be easy for Norris this year. And it’s looking more and more likely that Oscar will be his biggest threat in 2025. But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s still Norris who has more experience – and he’s proven that he can learn and improve.

– Oleg Karpov

Never underestimate Max Verstappen

Fortunes can shift quickly in the volatile world of Formula 1: one week you’re celebrated and praised, the next you’re staring at the gearbox of a Haas or Alpine for half the race. As strong as Oscar Piastri’s performance in Bahrain was, one thing must be remembered: never underestimate Max Verstappen. We saw why just a week and a half ago in Suzuka. While everyone expected McLaren to dominate, the reigning world champion squeezed every last drop out of his RB21 on Saturday to snatch pole position. We all know how Sunday played out.

Of course, Bahrain was rough. But Verstappen did what he does better than anyone else: he maximised the result. Even when the pace isn’t there, he extracts everything from his RB21. Sixth place was the limit in Bahrain, and with that, he managed to limit the damage reasonably well. Without the safety car, things could have turned out far worse. And if there’s one driver among the top teams who knows how to win a championship, it’s Verstappen. His main rival on paper (read: Lando Norris) hardly looks faultless or entirely reliable either.

One thing is certain: Red Bull will improve over the coming months. It can’t really get much worse. As long as the competition keeps taking points off each other and Verstappen continues doing what needs to be done, anything remains possible. Especially when the flexi-wing ban kicks in later in Barcelona – the competitive order could easily shift again. That may play into Red Bull’s hands.

Last year, McLaren proved you can still fight for prizes after a poor start to the season. The drivers’ title wasn’t within reach then because Norris missed too many opportunities. If there’s one thing we know, it’s that Verstappen will grab every chance that comes his way. That’s exactly where he makes the difference. And exactly why you should never count him out.

– Casper Bekking