Oscar Piastri has revealed the reason why his relationship with manager Mark Webber has changed for the 2026 season.
Australian driver Piastri, 25, endured a difficult opening two races in Melbourne and Shanghai — crashing out in the opener, before both McLarens failed to start in China.
However, he recovered impressively in Japan to take a superb second place behind Drivers’ Championship leader Kimi Antonelli.
And he is experiencing this rollercoaster campaign without the hands-on presence of advisor Webber, 49.
Piastri was regularly seen alongside Webber at races during the 2025 season, but is no longer a staple at the Grands Prix as he takes more of a backseat position in his man’s career.
Webber was embroiled in a close title battle with Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso in 2010.
He ultimately finished third, 14 points behind champion Vettel — a result which mirrored Piastri last year as he came up 13 points short of teammate Lando Norris.
Yet despite Webber having plenty of advice for Piastri, the McLaren star feels he now has enough experience to decipher situations without him by his side.
He said: “[Webber] is still very much involved, and I’ve still spoken to him a lot through the start of the year.
“I’m getting more experience in my own career, and there’s also an element of I’ve just got more experience, so I can make some of these decisions, ask some of these questions myself.
“Especially the first couple of years or especially year one of F1, there were a lot of questions that hadn’t even crossed my mind that Mark was asking as if they were obvious to me and the team.
“I think now some of those questions come a lot more naturally for me. It’s just a natural evolution, really.”
In the absence of Webber at races, Piastri’s race engineer for his F2 triumph, Pedro Matos, is accompanying him to Grands Prix.
Due to the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabia races, next up on the calendar is Miami in May.
Piastri took victory at the US race last year, but will face a tougher assignment this time around given the speed of Mercedes duo Antonelli and George Russell.