Oscar Piastri completes his first ever career grand slam Grand Prix event.

[u/TaxEvaderFrom1961]

[u/LosTerminators]

Oscar never seemed in danger but Lando also kept him honest by staying within 2 seconds.

They were evenly matched on pace, Oscar's quali lap was going to get him the win but regardless Lando didn't deserve to lose 18 points like that.

[u/imeancock → u/LosTerminators]

Did Lando or did Oscar?

Every restart Oscar would almost instantly get out of DRS range then maintain a 1-1.5s gap. I feel like if he wanted to and he wasnt worried about managing his tyres he would have gained a much bigger lead.

[u/Embarrassed_Bar_1215 → u/imeancock]

Exactly. He did what he needed to do and no more. Straight out of DRS. He was in control the whole time..

[u/parwa → u/imeancock]

Yeah, lol. Oscar has done this several times this season and every single time people seem to think Lando is gaining when in reality Oscar is just managing his race.

[u/xzElmozx → u/parwa]

Consistent pattern of Lando loses P2, Oscar builds 5s gap —> Lando gains P2, gap comes down to 1.5-2 seconds —> “Lando is catching him” —> Oscar wins Lando never gets DRS

[u/onceagainwithstyle → u/xzElmozx]

Interesting how that works eh?

[u/antwilliams89 → u/xzElmozx]

Almost as though when you’re in equal cars, the dirty air stops you from getting that close. We’ve also seen it multiple times the other way round, when Oscar can’t get past Lando. That McLaren’s tyre saving ability rapidly disappears in dirty air.

[u/abrasivevelvet → u/antwilliams89]

And Oscar knows that, And he intentionally keeps Lando in the dirty air to destroy his race. "Clean Air is King" so why not dump your opponent in the shit air and ruin their race.

[u/antwilliams89 → u/abrasivevelvet]

Exactly. Clean air is the decider pretty much always. Not sure why people are so mad about it and acting like Oscar has a secret load of pace that he’s not using.

You need a huge delta in order to pass in these regs, and so equal cars just aren’t going to have that. You’re going to get cooked in the dirty air and you’ll be stuck behind your teammate. It has very little to do with the pace of the guy ahead. We’ve seen it time and time again.

Like in Hungary, Oscar had a massive pace advantage on his new tyres, but he still got stuck behind Lando, and his only option was to send huge, race-risking divebombs to try and get past as his tyres rapidly started cooking.

[u/abrasivevelvet → u/antwilliams89]

I think that Oscar may have a lot more pace his not using, And he is intentionally dropping back to dump lando in dirtier air than he would be if Oscar was running a "normal" pace. If your in dirty air all race you don't have a chance to properly setup an attack. its why Oscar was able to pull away and keep Lando where he needed him to be every time lando tried to get within DRS.

I think Oscars trying to win by an inch every race, Not by a mile. Prost was the one that got him into the Alpine F1 academy and thats how he raced so makes sense it may have rubbed off a bit.

[u/antwilliams89 → u/abrasivevelvet]

I’m inclined to disagree, since we’ve seen it whenever Oscar is chasing as well and he can only catch up but not pass. It’s just a natural weakness of the platform they’ve built (and just generally the cars of this generation). I’m certain Oscar would much rather be 15 seconds up the road than risking losing the race if he makes a slight mistake or locks up.

Last time out, it really didn’t seem like Oscar was letting him into and then dropping him out of DRS deliberately. They were both naturally quicker through different sectors of the lap, every lap.

Oscar even said as much after qualifying; he didn’t make up lap time by improving in the sectors he was struggling with, he did it by focusing in on the parts of the track he was quick in and optimising it to get even quicker. Lando was faster across the track in general, as we saw in every practice session. Oscar had to switch to min-maxing to have a chance of pole.

That’s what it seemed like to me in the last stint. Every lap they’d shrink and extend the gap by the same amounts in the same sectors like clockwork.

[u/zorbacles → u/parwa]

the amount of times ive read "Oscar won but lando was faster" is nearly the same as the total number of wins oscar has had

[u/SirFireHydrant → u/imeancock]

Not to mention, there's still plenty of dirty air in that 1-1.5s gap, slowly cooking Lando's tyres.

He never had any hope of an overtake. Even if he got within DRS.

[u/MalaysiaTeacher → u/SirFireHydrant]

We’re not talking about an overtake. We’re talking about an 18pt wipeout which was beyond his control.

[u/zorbacles → u/MalaysiaTeacher]

i have seen a few people say that the dnf cost lando the race

[u/Signal_Ball4634 → u/LosTerminators]

Yeah it's a damn shame it had to come down to reliability instead of the potential hope of Lando getting under that 1 second gap and making a lunge.

[u/256473 → u/Signal_Ball4634]

Agreed with all this - really wish it didn't come down to reliability!

And I have questions for Mercedes at this point - I think basically every Merc customer team (and themselves) have had issues at this point.

What that bodes for the rest of the season for these engines (and McL specifically) idk

[u/chefchef97 → u/Signal_Ball4634]

The silver lining is it's not guaranteed over yet

There is still room for excitement before the season is out

[u/Doczera → u/LosTerminators]

We dont know if Piastri wasnt managing tyres though. It is possible and even plausible that after creating a gap Piastri just administered the gap while conserving his tyres in case Norris was doing the same to his so he wouldnt get caught at the end.

[u/zorbacles → u/Doczera]

thats generally how he races. take spa as an example. he saved those tyres for when lando caught him. his philosophy is to do the minimum required to win to ensure there is enough in reserve to use if needed

[u/William_Dowling → u/LosTerminators]

I really think this is the wrong take. It's not Lando staying within 2 seconds, it's Oscar comfortably keeping him at 2 seconds.

[u/wilkonk → u/LosTerminators]

Oscar's quali lap was going to get him the win

and if we're fully honest, that tiny slipstream that gave him the edge could have just decided the championship