Formula 1 pundit Will Buxton has explained Red Bull’s long-standing regret at not signing Oscar Piastri, saying the team knows it “missed the bus” with the Australian star.
Amid reports Piastri has emerged as Red Bull’s top candidate to replace Max Verstappen if the four-time world champion decides to leave the team or Formula 1, Buxton said the team had always regretted not signing the Melbourne-born racer as a junior.
Motorsport.com reported after the Miami Grand Prix Red Bull chiefs were ready to activate “the Piastri plan” if Verstappen decided to make the switch to another team on the grid, take a break from the sport or turn his back on Formula 1, having made no secret of his dissatisfaction with regulation changes.
Buxton said it was no surprise, given Red Bull has “had its eyes” on Piastri for years and regretted allowing Alpine to sign him as a junior before McLaren pounced.
“Now this is interesting for a number of reasons, but the first being that Red Bull, I think, are taking Max’s threat very seriously if they are seriously lining up people that they would like to replace him with,” Buxton said on the Up to Speed podcast.
“Red Bull has had its eyes on Oscar Piastri for years,” Buxton later added.
“They’ve gone on the record as stating that they wished they’d signed him when he was a junior driver, that they shouldn’t have let him go into the Alpine Academy.
“They shouldn’t have then let McLaren get their hands on him and tear him away from Alpine. They know they missed the bus when it came to Oscar Piastri.”
Piastri is in his fourth season with McLaren, having finished third in last year’s championship.
Buxton said there was no doubt over Piastri’s ability to win a world title, but questioned if he could “lead” and “mould” a team.
“Can he be that magnetic force that ties together a team and pushes them as one in the direction that a great champion like a Lewis (Hamilton) or a Michael Schumacher or somebody that turned up at a team and really helped to create a culture at that team?
“Does he have that and I don’t know.”
‘NOT TRYING TO KILL ANY RIVALRIES’
Supercars title winner Will Brown has denied his peacemaking party that brought Brodie Kostecki and Chaz Mostert together after their on-track stoush in Christchurch was a PR stunt, declaring “we’re not trying to kill any rivalries”.
It appeared Kostecki and Mostert had buried the hatchet at Brown’s Toowoomba bash last month after the escalation of their on-track battle in New Zealand.
After Kostecki lashed out at Mostert on his Lucky Dogs podcast, labelling the defending Supercars champion’s driving as “malicious”, the pair was seen laughing and joking in a video shared on social media.
There has been plenty of murmurings since that the catch-up turned out to be a PR stunt orchestrated by a savvy social media type in a bid to stop social online hate, but Brown denied the Kostecki and Mostert Toowoomba meeting was a set-up.
“Not at all a PR stunt,” Brown said.
“We’re not trying to kill any rivalries or anything like that, we were just all there having a beer. At the end of the day, there was only meant to be Brodie and Jackson Walls coming up, that was the plan.
“Then it ended up being a bigger thing than I expected, a lot more drivers.
“At the end of the day, to be honest, we all know what we are like and Chaz didn’t want to exactly do that to Brodie, so off the track everyone just accepts what it is these days.”
FAN FAITH AMID BATHURST HIGHWAY THREAT
Supercars fans have delivered the most emphatic possible statement of faith in the Bathurst 1000 — snapping up all 7000 campsites at Mount Panorama in less than 90 minutes, despite the very real prospect of a nightmare trip to the Mountain this October.
The sellout was announced on Monday with a 93 per cent renewal rate from returning campers setting a new record before the public sale even opened.
More than 25,000 fans will camp at what is billed as the Southern Hemisphere’s largest annual camping gathering when the Great Race runs October 8-11.
The enthusiasm is all the more remarkable given the Great Western Highway remains closed at Victoria Pass following the catastrophic structural failure of the 200-year-old Mitchells Causeway in March. The NSW Government has already conceded the closure will extend beyond June, and Track Torque can reveal government sources have privately acknowledged a 12-month closure is the realistic scenario, with a formal announcement expected shortly.
Fans travelling from Sydney face a lengthy detour via Bells Line of Road – one that during Bathurst race week could stretch well beyond a six-hour ordeal.
They’re coming anyway. All 7000 sites say so.
SHOOSH
The Matt Payne contract saga continues, with Team 18 refusing to back down in its bid to poach the star driver from Grove Racing.
It can be revealed that Team 18 has put a Chevrolet-backed offer on the table to sign the young Kiwi from 2028.
The rumour mill was in overdrive last week, with talk that Payne had signed that deal, but we have been told he is still a free agent beyond next year.
Don’t be surprised if tensions between the two teams spill from the backroom to the track, with the two outfits now officially enemies.
SPOTTED
What do Formula 1 drivers get up to during a three-week break between grands prix?
They go to the karting track, of course.
Ahead of this week’s return to racing at the Canadian Grand Prix, Piastri shared a series of snaps on social media of himself and fellow F1 drivers Alex Albon and Gabriel Bortoleto taking to the karting track at Brignoles in France.
In his typically understated style, Piastri simply captioned the post “natural habitat”.