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<\/p>\nOscar Piastri has made a career of keeping his emotions to himself, but even the unflappable Australian needed time to process the bitter championship defeat of 2025.<\/p>\n
Piastri had topped the Formula 1 title table for 15 rounds, more than any other driver. He\u2019d scored seven of his nine wins and all of his six pole positions. He failed to take home a podium trophy from only six grands prix.<\/p>\n
But in an almost inexplicable and brutally brief run of three grands prix in the Americas, what had been at one stage a commanding 34-point slipped dramatically away. Teammate Lando Norris took top spot, then Max Verstappen slid into second place.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Fox Sports, available on Kayo Sports, is the only place to watch every practice, qualifying session and race in the 2026 FIA Formula One World Championship\u2122 LIVE in 4K. New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\n Piastri started the Abu Dhabi season finale as a championship outsider, and despite beating Norris to second place in the race, he ended his third Formula 1 season defeated by the Briton by 13 points.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously the first few days straight after the race were difficult,\u201d he told select media, including Fox Sports.<\/p>\n It took a trip home to Melbourne for the ordinarily rock-solid Aussie to find his way back to equilibrium.<\/p>\n \u201cIt just comes with time,\u201d he said, hinting at the emotional toll defeat took after a junior career comprising almost exclusively title victories.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce I got home and I was able to spend time with my family and friends, it was just nice to think of all the good moments that happened after as well, not just some of the more painful ones.<\/p>\n \u201cMy family, the support team around me \u2014 speaking about it with those kinds of people was important.<\/p>\n \u201cYou feel it rather than going, \u2018Okay, now I\u2019m back in Australia it\u2019s all fine\u2019. As much as I wish that\u2019s how it worked, it wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen it comes up, you deal with it, and you move on.\u201d<\/p>\n And moving on was imperative.<\/p>\n READ MORE <\/p>\n \u2018THERE WILL BE CHAOS\u2019: Piastri\u2019s Aus GP call as Aussie star makes big McLaren admission<\/a><\/p>\n STATE OF PLAY: Where every star stands in most explosive F1 silly season yet as 17-driver chaos looms <\/a><\/p>\n EVERY TEAM: Fallen giant impossible to ignore; what will make or break wildcard <\/a><\/p>\n With this year\u2019s sweeping rule changes necessitating an unusually early start to the preseason, drivers had just a few weeks away from their teams before diving into the challenge of 2026.<\/p>\n Lamenting his loss would do no good on its own. Piastri had to understand where he\u2019d gone wrong, and fast.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s been a lot of conversations with the team on how we can approach things differently, approach things better,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n \u201cSome of those conversations are what you need to put things to bed sometimes. That\u2019s how you move on, by talking about things. That was important process to happen.<\/p>\n \u201cThis off-season was incredibly short; you very quickly put your mind towards the future instead of the past.\u201d<\/p>\n Now the future has arrived, and Piastri\u2019s preparation is set to be put to the test.<\/p>\n PIT TALK PODCAST: With just days before the opening grand prix of the season, Michael and Matt run the rule over the field to come up with a form guide for Melbourne \u2014 including the clear standout and Formula 1\u2019s crisis team of 2026.<\/p>\n REACH FOR THE CEILING<\/p>\n Piastri\u2019s 2025 title run stunned the sport as much as it did even his most hardcore supporters. It was clear the Australian was a title-calibre driver from his glittering junior career and his out-of-the-box speed in Formula 1, but most had expected him to be a four- or five-year project.<\/p>\n But his massive experience deficit to Norris, who started the campaign with almost three times as many race starts, proved no impediment to the young gun leading the way for much of the year.<\/p>\n That trajectory of improvement is at the heart of the narrative of Piastri\u2019s Formula 1 career to date.<\/p>\n But that necessarily must change this year.<\/p>\n Even if he remains among the eight least experienced competitors on the grid, he can no longer be considered fledgeling in his fourth campaign. <\/p>\n In 2026 he\u2019s an established Formula 1 driver, pole getter, race winner and title contender \u2014 a known quantity.<\/p>\n The curve has to begin levelling out eventually.<\/p>\n \u201cDefinitely I\u2019m getting closer to that ceiling [of potential],\u201d he said. \u201cI certainly felt like that in 2025, and I think the results and a lot of the race weekends showed that.<\/p>\n \u201cAt the end of 2024 I felt like I was able to get on top of all the different areas I needed to, just not really all at the same time or on the same weekend,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think probably the biggest positive of 2025 for me was that I was able to put all of those strengths and lessons together so much more often.\u201d<\/p>\n This year will be about more than just raw ability, however.<\/p>\n The massive regulation changes \u2014 billed as the biggest in Formula 1 history \u2014 have reimagined some elements of what it means to compete at the grand prix level.<\/p>\n The cars are smaller and lighter and have less downforce but these changes are well within the F1 realm, even with the added tricks of moveable bodywork.<\/p>\n The power unit, however, is a totally different beast.<\/p>\n Split between 400 kilowatts from the combustion engine and 350 kilowatts from the electrical motor, balancing power and range is now crucial to the driving challenge.<\/p>\n That\u2019s because there are very few tracks on the calendar at which drivers won\u2019t run out of battery.<\/p>\n The hybrid motor charges the battery mostly under brakes, but it can also recover energy when the driver lifts off the throttle at the end of the straights \u2014 lifting and coasting. The car can also automatically redirect power from the internal combustion engine to the battery through high-speed corners as required.<\/p>\n At circuits like Monaco, for example \u2014 where braking zones are plentiful \u2014 this is unlikely to be a problem.<\/p>\n At tracks like Melbourne, however \u2014 where straights dominate and there are few big stops \u2014 the battery will be flatter than a phone that\u2019s reached its date of planned obsolescence.<\/p>\n Understanding how the car needs to be driven defined the preseason program of every team.<\/p>\n \u201cI think this year\u2019s cars are so different, and we\u2019re talking about adapting to things that we\u2019ve never even considered as a race car driver before,\u201d Piastri said. \u201cThat\u2019s a very new process.<\/p>\n \u201cTwo months ago we probably thought we had a pretty good understanding, and then we went testing and realised that there was a whole bunch of stuff that we didn\u2019t necessarily understand. There were a few surprises for us.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m certainly more comfortable now than I was a couple of months ago with how to drive these cars and how to try and get the most out of them, but you don\u2019t know what you don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we\u2019re as prepared as we can be, and I\u2019ve certainly put in a lot of hard work to try and understand it as well as I can, but I think if you fast-forward time and you come to Melbourne next year and then the year after, we\u2019re probably going to look at this year going, \u2018I don\u2019t know why we did some of those things\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cWithout the advantage of hindsight, I think we\u2019re in a good place.\u201d<\/p>\n Kayo & Fox Sports secure new F1 Deal | 03:40<\/p>\n ADAPT OR PERISH<\/p>\n The Australian Grand Prix\u2019s position as the first round of Formula 1\u2019s new era means this weekend\u2019s race begins with so many unanswered questions, many of which will receive only partial responses even by Sunday night.<\/p>\n One thing that appeared to become clear during testing in Bahrain, though is that the new energy management regime will see the cars take a step backwards in high-speed cornering performance.<\/p>\n The so-called \u2018super clipping\u2019 protocol effectively turns the combustion engine into a generator, redirecting 250 kilowatts to the battery and leaving only 150 kilowatts to power the wheels.<\/p>\n In Bahrain it manifested as car speed plateauing through the usually rapid turn 12 and also looking distinctly uninspiring through the esses of turns 5, 6 and 7.<\/p>\n This is likely to be the case at fast corners around the world, including, as just one example, the normally fearsome turn 9-10 chicane in Melbourne.<\/p>\n That could present a problem for Piastri. One of his major strengths has been pushing the envelope through high-speed corners \u2014 he was reliably better than Norris at circuits where high- and medium-speed bends dominated.<\/p>\n There are concerns ahead of the season that the regulations could neuter that advantage by effectively setting a hard limit on how hard drivers can push through these sorts of corners, with the battery leaching power from the combustion engine.<\/p>\n It adds another question into the mix for Piastri, whose high-profile struggles with low-grip tracks late in the year will inevitably become a talking point as those races begin looming large on the horizon after the midseason break.<\/p>\n \u201cI think some of the learnings just from a driving style point of view, there were still some things that suited me better than others, and that\u2019s just natural in the way you drive \u2014 everyone\u2019s going to have their things that they find easier to adapt to and things that they find harder to adapt to,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think for me what was very positive out of last year was that the process of attacking something that was either new or I needed to get on top of worked well, and I think you can apply that to anything.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s not to say there aren\u2019t elements of these rules that could play to Piastri\u2019s strengths.<\/p>\n The Australian isn\u2019t the sort of driver to jump in the car and thrash it. Deeply analytical and reflective, much of his vaunted trajectory of improvement has been down to his willingness to comprehend his own strengths and weaknesses to raise both his floor and his ceiling.<\/p>\n That sort of cerebral approach to his craft could be rewarded in a year muscle memory could count for less.<\/p>\n \u201cI think a lot of my adaptation comes through understanding things,\u201d he said. \u201cI think there are two avenues you can take. One is understanding something and then doing what you think is the best for that. The other one is just experimenting with all kinds of stuff and seeing what works and what doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n \u201cI think a combination of the two is probably the right balance, but definitely I like to think my brain\u2019s pretty logical, and doing things for a reason is generally an important thing for me.<\/p>\n \u201cThe more I understand about these cars, then the quicker you try and learn.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me generally, understanding the things I need to do comes pretty quickly, so hopefully that is an advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n Middle East conflict to impact AUS GP | 05:00<\/p>\n EXECUTION IS EVERYTHING<\/p>\n All of this assumes, of course, that McLaren will be in a condition to put Piastri into the championship mix.<\/p>\n The team has won the last two constructors titles in succession \u2014 it dominated the count last year \u2014 and Norris\u2019s 2025 title victory completed the comeback after a decade in the competitive wilderness.<\/p>\n Had the rules not changed, McLaren would have been in the thick of a championship-winning dynasty, with a technical team operating at the highest level and arguably the best balance driver line-up on the grid.<\/p>\n Instead its accumulated advantage has been cut down by the sweeping rule changes.<\/p>\n Suspicions are that works teams will have an early lead given the importance of understanding the power unit. McLaren is the only non-works team among the presumed top four constructors.<\/p>\n McLaren is also taking a slightly different approach to those other leaders, holding fire on major upgrades until later in the season. It\u2019s the sort of steady approach that worked well in recent seasons but that must be proved for the new rules.<\/p>\n Team principal Andrea Stella said \u201cthe first part of the season will see us playing a bit defensively, trying to exploit the counterattack\u201d.<\/p>\n In other words, he isn\u2019t expecting to be victory favourites early in the campaign.<\/p>\n Piastri, though, doesn\u2019t see it quite so simply. Instead he thinks this phase of the season will offer prizes for those who can execute most cleanly on the day rather than those with the greatest performance potential.<\/p>\n \u201cI think building your level of knowledge and understanding at the moment is the most important thing, because this year more than certainly previous years we\u2019re going to see a lot of change through the year,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn 2022, for example, when there were new regulations, we saw Ferrari being very quick at the start and Red Bull finding their feet. Even for us through 2023.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s going to be a lot of big gains and areas where if you don\u2019t execute well enough, it can be a big penalty.<\/p>\n \u201cI think just trying to make sure you get things right, be consistent \u2014 that\u2019s obviously a very important part.<\/p>\n \u201cEventually \u2014 ideally from the start, but certainly eventually \u2014 you want to be fast and consistent as well, but I think execution and not falling into any traps at the start of the season is going to be a very important thing.\u201d<\/p>\n The first trap?<\/p>\n The Australian Grand Prix, the first of 24 potential pitfalls as teams and drivers navigate these new regulations while attempting to fight for the championship.<\/p>\n The 2025 season was bitterly disappointing for Piastri as his first championship defeat as a genuine title contender in any series in almost a decade, but 2026 must be the culmination of three years of tough lessons and the indispensable experience of fighting in motorsport\u2019s brightest spotlight.<\/p>\n The past is behind him. Piastri\u2019s future is here now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oscar Piastri has made a career of keeping his emotions to himself, but even the unflappable Australian needed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":519002,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[944,13273,259192,1724,64,63,689,258329,936,259190,259189,259199,239765,259209,259205,259208,84696,59961,248279,31730,259203,21743,259202,259195,259196,817,813,816,653,48260,2105,259200,14211,259193,73225,259207,155955,1737,259197,259201,5120,825,647,258363,18896,259191,677,225380,2119,101420,259194,102412,18923,240787,167759,86307,33114,35454,194449,85,212299,207058,13773,23055,3712,43367,131072,259204,209117,259198,29994,660,259206,12000,254584],"class_list":{"0":"post-519001","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-abu-dhabi","9":"tag-andrea-stella","10":"tag-approach-things","11":"tag-asia","12":"tag-au","13":"tag-australia","14":"tag-australia-and-new-zealand","15":"tag-australian-ace","16":"tag-bahrain","17":"tag-balance-driver","18":"tag-battery-leaching","19":"tag-bitter-championship-defeat","20":"tag-car-changes","21":"tag-car-needs","22":"tag-championship-mix","23":"tag-championship-outsider","24":"tag-combustion-engine","25":"tag-constructors-title","26":"tag-crisis-team","27":"tag-doing-things","28":"tag-driver-lifts","29":"tag-driving-style","30":"tag-driving-style-point","31":"tag-emotional-toll-defeat","32":"tag-energy-management-regime","33":"tag-f1","34":"tag-formula-1","35":"tag-formula1","36":"tag-fox-sports-news","37":"tag-genuine-title-contender","38":"tag-getty-images-inc","39":"tag-grand-prix-level","40":"tag-grands-prix","41":"tag-hardcore-supporters","42":"tag-high-speed-corners","43":"tag-indispensable-experience","44":"tag-junior-career","45":"tag-lando-norris","46":"tag-massive-experience-deficit","47":"tag-massive-regulation-changes","48":"tag-matt","49":"tag-max-verstappen","50":"tag-melbourne","51":"tag-michael-lamonato","52":"tag-midseason-break","53":"tag-non-works-team","54":"tag-oceania","55":"tag-opening-grand-prix","56":"tag-pit-talk","57":"tag-podium-trophy","58":"tag-pole-getter","59":"tag-pole-positions","60":"tag-power-unit","61":"tag-preseason-program","62":"tag-race-car-driver","63":"tag-race-starts","64":"tag-race-weekends","65":"tag-season-finale","66":"tag-season-launch","67":"tag-sports","68":"tag-support-team","69":"tag-sweeping-rule-changes","70":"tag-team-principal","71":"tag-title-contender","72":"tag-title-run","73":"tag-title-table","74":"tag-title-victory","75":"tag-title-calibre-driver","76":"tag-travis-auld","77":"tag-trip-home","78":"tag-united-arab-emirates","79":"tag-victoria","80":"tag-victory-favourite","81":"tag-western-asia","82":"tag-works-teams"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=519001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/519002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=519001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=519001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=519001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}