After winning the 2025 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, Oscar Piastri has taken the lead of the Championship for the first time in his career. His recent string of performances has placed him as a serious Championship contender this year. However, Helmut Marko is not yet sure about how consistent he can be throughout the season.
Ahead of the 2025 season, Lando Norris was considered to be the strongest driver coming out of the McLaren camp. However, the first 5 races of the season have proven that Piastri cannot be overlooked. From what it seems, the Drivers’ Championship is between the McLaren drivers and Max Verstappen.
Helmut Marko places doubt on Oscar Piastri’s consistency
Oscar has now won 3 out of the first 5 races. Despite this fact, Marko is not sure about his consistency across 24 races in the season. Here’s what he wrote in his column on Speedweek.
“Piastri has now taken the lead in the World Championship for the first time in his career and, with performances like those in recent races, is establishing himself as his main challenger. However, it remains to be seen whether Oscar can maintain this level of performance throughout the entire season. Last year, there were one or two tracks where the Australian fell slightly to significantly behind Lando Norris.”
🟠| Zak Brown also had a post race announcement to make 😅:
I’m here to announce to everyone: I think he’s only going to get stronger.”
[ 📰&📷 @F1 ]#F1 #SuadiArabianGP pic.twitter.com/V5QQWlOTes
— Fastest Pitstop (@FastestPitStop) April 20, 2025
During the 2024 season, McLaren began to compete for race wins against Red Bull and Ferrari from the Miami Grand Prix. However, it was largely Lando who was battling with Verstappen last year. Although Oscar did manage to get a couple of wins, he was not able to consistently challenge at the top. He was comparatively slower than Norris in a handful of races.
However, this is a completely new season. Given that this is just Aussie’s 3rd year in F1, he finds ways to improve with every single race. The Oscar that we are seeing this year is completely different from the one we have seen in the past couple of years.
What Oscar Piastri needs to do to stay ahead in the Championship
As mentioned above, the 2025 Drivers’ Championship is between the McLaren drivers and Verstappen. Piastri just needs to keep doing what he’s been doing. The only race where the Australian driver did not finish on the podium this year was in the first race of the season in his home town. If not for the mistake that landed him on the grass in Melbourne, he would be leading the Championship by a much larger margin.
Although Verstappen showed pace in circuits with more high-speed and flowing corners, the RB21 is not consistent enough to provide the Dutch driver with pace throughout the season. Red Bull will need to bring some significant developments to the car if they hope to help Max challenge the McLarens in every single race.
Max Verstappen Acknowledges Oscar Piastri as Potential Championship Challenger
Lando, on the other hand, has been making too many mistakes this season. These mistakes often come during crucial parts of qualifying, leading to a poor position on the grid to start the race. Given how difficult overtaking is with these modern F1 cars, it makes it very difficult for Norris to fight back during the race. In regards to pure pace, he is more or less at par with Piastri.
Piastri’s Championship chances for this season largely depend on consistency. While he has shown some outstanding pace in the first 5 races, he needs to continue showing this pace for another 19 races this year. If he does so, there is a strong possibility we will see him take the Championship trophy at the end of the year.
Do you think Oscar Piastri can deliver consistently to win the Championship? Post your thoughts in the comments section below.
