{"id":594303,"date":"2026-04-08T22:27:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T22:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/594303\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T22:27:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T22:27:10","slug":"oscar-piastri-break-mclaren-tyre-testing-top-earner-in-australia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/594303\/","title":{"rendered":"Oscar Piastri break, McLaren tyre testing, top earner in Australia"},"content":{"rendered":"

During this unintentional spring break from F1<\/a> racing, Australian driver Oscar Piastri<\/a> will be putting his downtime to good use with a round of tyre testing for team McLaren<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Having just turned 25 on Monday, Piastri is spending the break bouncing between his home in Monaco and the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking, with his primary focus to work with his team to get the MCL40 up to speed with their rivals.<\/p>\n

The team will also be out on track at the N\u00fcrburgring for a Pirelli tyre test on April 14 and 15, alongside Mercedes to carry out dry-tyre test for the tyre manufacturer.<\/p>\n

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\"Oscar<\/p>\n

Oscar Piastri seen after qualifying.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

“It’s a good opportunity to get some good training in as well,” Piastri said in a video posted to McLaren’s Instagram page.<\/p>\n

“Obviously the off-season this year was very short, so it’s a nice little window for everyone to get some good training in.<\/p>\n

“Just some more time to prepare, basically. I think we’ve learned a lot in the first few races and still plenty more to learn, so just gives us more time to analyse stuff, sit down, digest it and try and come back stronger for Miami.”<\/p>\n

Off the track, Piastri’s stock continues to soar.<\/p>\n

He was recently named Australia’s top earner in sport by The Sydney Morning Herald<\/a>, estimating his earnings to be between $57-59 million.<\/p>\n

The figures point to his lucrative partnerships with Google, Quadlock, Monster Energy and Grill’d<\/a>adding millions of extra dollars to his yearly earnings.<\/p>\n

Piastri is well clear of his closest earnings rival, LIV Golf<\/a>‘s Cam Smith<\/a> who makes at least $11 million less than the Melburnian.<\/p>\n

\"Formula<\/p>\n

Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri of the McLaren Mastercard Formula 1 Team.\u00a0NurPhoto via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Across the paddock, teams are using this time to test out different strategies on the simulator while the governing body has ongoing discussions surrounding regulations<\/a> which teams will need to keep on top of.<\/p>\n

Other drivers are taking their driving expertise elsewhere to fill their time and keep their skills sharp, Aston Martin<\/a>‘s Lance Stroll taking on GT World Challenge Europe at Paul Ricard on April 11-12, joining GT3 co-drivers Roberto Merhi<\/a> and Mari Boya.<\/p>\n

Max Verstappen<\/a> heads back to the GT3 arena<\/a> to participate in the ADAC 24h N\u00fcrburgring qualifiers on April 18-19.<\/p>\n

Formula 1 will officially be back in action in Miami<\/a>, where last year Piastri and teammate Lando Norris<\/a> achieved a historic 1-2 victory for McLaren.<\/p>\n

The team will be aiming to improve their overall speed to consistently match their rivals Mercedes<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During this unintentional spring break from F1 racing, Australian driver Oscar Piastri will be putting his downtime to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":594304,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-594303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594303","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=594303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/594304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}