Jun.10 (GMM) Oscar Piastri is impressive, but he’s “not yet” eye-to-eye with 2025 world championship rival Max Verstappen.
That’s the view of Dr Helmut Marko, the long-time F1 advisor at Red Bull who has increasingly been naming championship leader Piastri as the stand-out driver at McLaren.
He told Kronen Zeitung recently: “Piastri has learned incredibly quickly.
“He prepares well and is tough in the decisive moments, while (Lando) Norris is more of a trial-and-error player and doesn’t display the same level of consistency.”
In more recent comments, this time on Red Bull-owned broadcaster Servus TV, 82-year-old Marko also said of the young Australian: “He’s a naturally cool-headed analyst.
“Very little unsettles him. But he’s not yet at Max’s level.”
The Austrian said a key example was Monaco, where Norris was “clearly stronger” in the sister McLaren.
“He has his ups and downs,” Marko said of Piastri, who sits ten points ahead of Norris at the very top of the 2025 drivers’ standings.
However, he acknowledged that a comparison with Verstappen is perhaps unfair, as he thinks the quadruple world champion is “the perfect driver”.
Nonetheless, he is impressed not only with Piastri’s speed, but also his calculating nature – like when the 24-year-old noticed Verstappen was running new hard compound tyres behind the safety car in Barcelona.
“We couldn’t get them up to temperature,” said Marko. “Piastri also drove slowly before the restart. Despite his young age, he’s a seasoned driver and knew that Max was running on the hard tyres.”
Marko admits that if Red Bull cannot quickly improve its car, Verstappen’s push for a fifth consecutive drivers’ title “will eventually be over” – with Piastri in the box seat.
“In the constructors’ championship, we’ve already written off the overall victory,” Marko told Speed Week. “We no longer have a chance there.
“This is, of course, also due to the second driver, because Yuki Tsunoda is only slowly getting up to speed.”
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