{"id":768859,"date":"2026-06-30T01:11:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T01:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/768859\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T01:11:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T01:11:11","slug":"f1-news-2026-max-verstappens-team-meets-with-mclaren-oscar-piastri-rumours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/768859\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 news 2026: Max Verstappen\u2019s team meets with McLaren, Oscar Piastri rumours"},"content":{"rendered":"

Max Verstappen<\/a>\u2019s representatives reportedly held talks with\u00a0McLaren<\/a> ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix, adding more fuel to the notion he is looking for a new home.<\/p>\n

According to\u00a0Sky Sports, discussions were initiated by the Dutchman\u2019s camp despite the four-time champion being contracted to Red Bull<\/a> until 2028.<\/p>\n

\"Verstappen's<\/p>\n

Verstappen’s team has reportedly met with McLaren.\u00a0NurPhoto via Getty Images<\/p>\n

But according to reports, performance-related clauses in his contract could allow him to exit the deal.<\/p>\n

While such conversations do occur during the sport\u2019s driver market, the report has raised questions because McLaren was not viewed as a realistic option.<\/p>\n

Additionally, talk of a potential swap deal between Verstappen and Oscar Piastri<\/a> has been hovering for weeks.<\/p>\n

Verstappen\u2019s long-serving race engineer at Red Bull, Gianpiero Lambiase, is also set to leave the team for McLaren.<\/p>\n

Their partnership has been instrumental in Verstappen\u2019s championship success, and that is not lost on the former champion.<\/p>\n

McLaren currently has Lando Norris<\/a> and Oscar Piastri <\/a>under contract, with both drivers playing a key role in the team\u2019s recent success.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Sky Sports before the race in Austria, McLaren boss Zak Brown indicated Verstappen was unlikely to join the F1<\/a> champions unless one of his current drivers \u201cslipped on a banana peel\u201d.<\/p>\n

The American was asked about possible interest in the Red Bull driver, for 2027 or later, now that Mercedes<\/a> have a rising star in championship leader Kimi Antonelli <\/a>alongside George Russell<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d be very surprised if Lando (Norris) or Oscar (Piastri) went elsewhere because they\u2019re very happy,\u201d Brown said of his current line-up.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, of course we\u2019ve got contracts but contracts aside, we\u2019re very happy with them (the two drivers), they\u2019re very happy here.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf for some strange reason, someone slipped on a banana peel getting out of the tub, then yeah, of course, Max is a four-time world champion.\u201d<\/p>\n

The American did not offer any clarification.<\/p>\n

Piastri finished fourth in Austria <\/a>with world champion Norris seventh. Verstappen was second, his best result of the year so far.<\/p>\n

McLaren are third overall, 44 points ahead of Red Bull but also as yet without a winning car.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Max Verstappen\u2019s representatives reportedly held talks with\u00a0McLaren ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix, adding more fuel to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":768860,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-768859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768859","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=768859"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768859\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/768860"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}