New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\nExcept last year. Last year was slightly different.<\/p>\n
In 2025 the nation\u2019s waning December attention was transfixed on events 11,650 kilometres away in Abu Dhabi as Oscar Piastri valiantly attempted to become Australia\u2019s first Formula 1 world champion in almost half a century.<\/p>\n
Piastri had led the championship for 15 rounds when teammate Lando Norris nabbed back the lead. Down but never out, Piastri took the right to the final round but fell short by an agonising 13 points.<\/p>\n
But when he flew home to Melbourne to lick the wounds of defeat, Piastri found that he couldn\u2019t simply walk into the embrace of the Australian summer.<\/p>\n
He had become part of it.<\/p>\n
His homecoming was a moment of national significance. Though he didn\u2019t return home a champion of Formula 1, he had proved himself worthy of a place in the Australian pantheon of international sporting icons. In sport-mad Australia and at the dawn of summer, it\u2019s an accolade without equal \u2014 and it was enough for Piastri to share a piece of the limelight with the national cricket team, even as it began the process of steamrollering England to retain the Ashes.<\/p>\n
For lifelong cricket fan Piastri, it was a moment of realisation of his elevated status.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always feel weird or strange even making that kind of comparison,\u201d he says. \u201cBut yes, I think I have kind of recognised that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think when I went back to Australia it was just the amount of people that \u2014 I think when I went home it was just nice to have people saying, \u2018Well done\u2019 or just wanting a handshake or stuff like that.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously when we go to the races a lot of people want selfies or autographs and stuff like that, but I think when I went home it was a bit different. There were a lot of people just genuinely wanting to say, \u2018Well done\u2019 or recognising what I\u2019d done.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was cool, definitely.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still have to remind myself that I\u2019m not the kid sat on the couch watching the Ashes, for example, going, \u2018It\u2019d be so cool to meet them\u2019 because I have met those players now.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose kinds of moments are still pinch-me moments. It\u2019s cool to have that recognition alongside those guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oblivious Perez crashes into Albon | 00:37<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t mistake this as the beginning of a Piastri arrogance streak. The effortlessly relaxed Melburnian offers no hint of pretence when he sits down to speak with Fox Sports.<\/p>\n
Instead there\u2019s a humility in the recognition of his membership among Australia\u2019s elite.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust meeting the national cricketers \u2014 it doesn\u2019t really matter if it was Ricky Ponting or Michael Clarke, who I grew up watching on TV, or whether it\u2019s Pat Cummins or Nathan Lyon or anyone in the team now, they\u2019re all people I\u2019ve watched on TV playing a sport that I\u2019ve always loved, and now I get to be able to meet them and they\u2019re asking me questions about my sport,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s pretty crazy to have those kinds of conversations and just be able to meet those people.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was more than the personalities; there were obviously some cool people that I\u2019ve met, but take the Australian cricket team, for example.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s more recognising the job of those people or what they do rather than the individual person.\u201d<\/p>\n
Greatness recognises greatness.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s about more than just achievement or even just the vibe of strutting their stuff on the world stage.<\/p>\n
The path from aspiring Australian young gun to elite international competitor isn\u2019t easily trod and can\u2019t happen without considerable sacrifice.<\/p>\n
But the journey is similar, even when the disciplines are diverse.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously each sport is a bit different, but I think there are a lot of similarities between a lot of different sports: the hard work especially, the sacrifice that goes in,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously the skills you need and the talent you need is wildly different, but the kind of effort you put in \u2014 the hard work, the training routines, the hours are all pretty similar across any sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think motorsport is maybe a bit different in that we can\u2019t go out and test as much as we want, but I think still the concept of finding gains wherever you can, resting, getting that side of things right, the fame as well in some respects \u2014 there are a lot of similarities.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s nice to be able to speak to people that share similar life experiences to you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cricket emerges as another analog, with the parallel travails of the current generation of rising stars providing a chance for each to learn from the other. The expression of their skills may be different, but the challenges are similar.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a really good chat to Cam Green a few years ago because we\u2019re both a pretty similar age and we were just talking about what it\u2019s like to move away from home, to change your life at such a young age and get to know how we dealt with it and things we miss, things, we like, those kinds of things,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think with some of the guys the same age as me, maybe we\u2019ve got a bit more in common and we\u2019re just at similar stages of our life.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt almost doesn\u2019t need to be spoken sometimes. I think there\u2019s just a natural understanding of how various elite environments work.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s a bit different in our sport is obviously we\u2019re doing a lot of not just media work but media work and sponsor work on the race weekends, which I think for a lot of other athletes blows their mind a little bit, especially the stuff on the grid. I think that\u2019s probably the biggest difference.\u201d<\/p>\n
Piastri upbeat ahead of Japan Grand Prix | 01:08<\/p>\n
In 2025 Piastri proved what so many suspected during his meteoric rise through the junior categories: that he has what it takes to contend for the world title.<\/p>\n
His defeat was so narrow that it fell comfortably within the grey areas of any championship season.<\/p>\n
What if he hadn\u2019t lost so many points in Melbourne? What if he hadn\u2019t crashed in Azerbaijan? What if McLaren hadn\u2019t fumbled in Qatar?<\/p>\n
For a bigger ego than Piastri, these moments and the so many others than contributed to the finely balanced outcome might have become chips on the shoulder in 2026, particularly as his season has struggled to get going.<\/p>\n
After two rounds Piastri has scored just three points to sit 12th in the championship standings. All those points have come from the sprint in Shanghai; he\u2019s yet to start a grand prix after crashing out of the formation lap in Australia and then being wheeled off the grid with an engine problem in China.<\/p>\n
Some drivers might find themselves weighed down by the burden of this slow start.<\/p>\n
Piastri, though \u2014 having convinced so thoroughly not just with his results last year but with the trajectory of his three campaigns in Formula 1 \u2014 refuses to be knocked off course.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think as you become more comfortable, you kind of make jokes about not doing the first two races of the year or stuff like that,\u201d he says. \u201cThat\u2019s just always how I\u2019ve been in some ways.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce you\u2019ve got some results and, let\u2019s say, some street cred to back it up, then you naturally feel a bit more comfortable showing yourself more and not being maybe the super professional F1 driver all the time and letting your personality show.\u201d<\/p>\n
Team principal Andrea Stella has long sung Piastri\u2019s praises not only for his speed but for his attitude, recognising in him the same traits that powered Michael Schumacher, Fernando Alonso and Kimi R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen to the top of the sport.<\/p>\n
Missing out on the championship last year and having so far been able to bounce back has been the acid test of Stella\u2019s perception, and Piastri has proven him emphatically right.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think this start of the season has given Oscar the opportunity to test where he was with his maturity, with his strength, with his ability to absorb adversity,\u201d Stella said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have to say that the team is so impressed by the strength that this driver is exhibiting and, I have to say, passing on to the team, because when you see a driver responding like that to a second race in which he was not in condition to be part of it, then this becomes extremely motivational for all the team.<\/p>\n
\u201cCredit to Oscar, credit to his own personal development, which is not only the development of a driver getting faster and faster but also of a person getting more and more mature and strong from a mental point of view.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now in his fourth season, Piastri is certainly faster and more mature. His journey along his meteoric trajectory continues.<\/p>\n
There are no guarantees in Formula 1, but that trajectory seems almost certain to deliver him to the Formula 1 promised land assuming McLaren can deliver him a title-contending car.<\/p>\n
But having proved himself all but equal to the championship challenge last year, his status in the Australian sporting landscape is assured.<\/p>\n
Come next summer, Piastri is sure to receive a hero\u2019s welcome home to Australia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ritual of the Australian summer lives in the bones. The weather warms as the days grow longer.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":568809,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[944,51051,13273,279662,1724,64,63,689,56117,279659,279660,29997,259498,961,21777,18257,64318,36339,13275,512,152418,279657,9239,279650,118424,90120,845,279648,28118,2105,841,279649,29973,279655,183946,279661,1737,279654,647,47483,844,806,805,803,804,29547,279651,279652,677,1948,61311,279656,279183,16260,33114,279653,6417,2072,4933,85,13773,52697,279658,660,12000,2753],"class_list":["post-568808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-abu-dhabi","tag-alex-bierens-de-haan","tag-andrea-stella","tag-arrogance-streak","tag-asia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-australian-cricket-team","tag-australian-pantheon","tag-australian-sporting-landscape","tag-australian-summer","tag-australian-young-gun","tag-azerbaijan","tag-championship-challenge","tag-championship-contention","tag-championship-season","tag-championship-standings","tag-charles-leclerc","tag-china","tag-cricket-team","tag-dent-enthusiasm","tag-eastern-asia","tag-elite-environments-work","tag-elite-sport","tag-engine-problem","tag-fernando-alonso","tag-finding-gains","tag-formation-lap","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-grand-prix","tag-greatness-recognises-greatness","tag-home-country","tag-international-sporting-icons","tag-junior-categories","tag-kid-sat","tag-lando-norris","tag-lifelong-cricket-fan","tag-melbourne","tag-michael-clarke","tag-michael-schumacher","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-nathan-lyon","tag-national-cricket-team","tag-natural-understanding","tag-oceania","tag-pat-cummins","tag-personal-development","tag-personality-show","tag-pinch-me-moment","tag-qatar","tag-race-weekends","tag-reality-hits","tag-ricky-ponting","tag-sergio-perez","tag-shanghai","tag-sports","tag-team-principal","tag-title-challenge","tag-title-comeback","tag-victoria","tag-western-asia","tag-world-champion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568808","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=568808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/568809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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