{"id":523206,"date":"2026-07-13T03:40:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/523206\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T03:40:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:40:15","slug":"f1-news-mark-webber-shuts-down-piastri-exit-talk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/523206\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 news: Mark Webber shuts down Piastri exit talk"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Webber
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOscar Piastri’s future at McLaren continues to be discussed. Image: Kym Illman<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Piastri\u2019s future has been dragged into persistent rumours recently surrounding Verstappen and his increasingly uncertain position at Red Bull.<\/p>\n

Several reports have suggested Verstappen\u2019s management explored potential opportunities at McLaren<\/a>, despite both Piastri and reigning world champion Lando Norris holding multi-year contracts with the team.<\/p>\n

Any move for Verstappen would therefore require McLaren to replace one of its current drivers, with speculation increasingly focusing on Piastri after reports raised the prospect of a direct swap with Red Bull.<\/p>\n

That has left the Australian facing repeated questions over his future, prompting his manager Webber to firmly reject suggestions Piastri is attempting to engineer an exit.<\/p>\n

\u201cOscar is contracted to McLaren for the foreseeable future,\u201d Webber told RACER.<\/p>\n

\u201cTalk of him agitating to leave is nonsense.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere has been a lot of fiction written about him and other teams\u2026 McLaren have repeatedly said they want him for the long term and Oscar is focused on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rumours intensified following reports McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown had met with Verstappen\u2019s manager Raymond Vermeulen before the Austrian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

Both parties denied the meeting involved negotiations over a potential move, but the speculation continued as questions grew over Verstappen\u2019s future at Red Bull.<\/p>\n

Piastri also reaffirmed his commitment to McLaren<\/a> during the British Grand Prix weekend, insisting he had received assurances over his position within the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got a contract in place, multiple reassurances that the team are very happy with me and I\u2019m very happy with the team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Brown has similarly maintained that McLaren has no vacancy to offer Verstappen, repeatedly expressing his satisfaction with Piastri and Norris.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very happy with my two racing drivers, Lando and Oscar,\u201d Brown said at Silverstone.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I think any time a name like Max is thrown around everyone gets pretty excited \u2013 a four-time world champion \u2013 but I\u2019m very happy with our driver line-up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t really thought about [what I could offer Verstappen] because I\u2019ve got two drivers in the seats. So, what I couldn\u2019t offer him was a seat in my race car.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Any talks] didn\u2019t go anywhere. I\u2019ve got my two drivers, so there\u2019s nothing to report.\u201d<\/p>\n

Verstappen remains contracted to Red Bull until 2028, although reports have claimed his deal contains a release clause connected to his championship position at the mid-season break.<\/p>\n

The Dutchman sits seventh in the 2026 drivers\u2019 standings following an inconsistent start to the new regulatory era for Red Bull.<\/p>\n

Its struggles have contributed to questions over whether Verstappen will remain with the team, particularly after rear wing issues were blamed for incidents<\/a> during the Austrian and British Grand Prix weekends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oscar Piastri’s future at McLaren continues to be discussed. Image: Kym Illman Piastri\u2019s future has been dragged into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523207,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[68086,3516,4262,111,139,69,7214,12362,9335,213],"class_list":["post-523206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-mark-webber","tag-max-verstappen","tag-mclaren","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-oscar-piastri","tag-red-bull","tag-slot2","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523206\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}