Piastri on rivalry with Norris: 'That comparison will be made'

Oscar Piastri is starting his first season in Formula 1 at McLaren. With Lando Norris, he has an equally young teammate, but one with four years of F1 experience already. The Australian admitted he's gets on well with Norris, but also knows he is his direct rival.

For Piastri, after a long run-up, things are finally about to begin. After the whole saga last year with Alpine and the year without a race seat, he will make his debut in F1 at McLaren in 2023. There, the young driver will replace his compatriot Daniel Ricciardo, whose contract was bought off by McLaren after disappointing performance.

F1 debut

At McLaren, Piastri will become Norris' new teammate, with whom he said he gets along very well. At a press briefing, Norris told GPblog and others that the two have not spoken very much yet.

''I haven't really asked him for advice yet and we haven't spent that much time together. Just some of the marketing activities here at McLaren. But you know, I think between the other people in the team, my engineers and stuff like that there's a wealth of experience there with rookie drivers and obviously Lando's, came through as a rookie with McLaren. So there's a lot of people in the team that have shared that journey with him, which is encouraging for me.''

Rivalry with Norris

Still, it's not as if Piastri and Norris will have to be the greatest of friends anytime soon. As an F1 driver, your teammate is perhaps your biggest rival, because that is the driver driving the same material as you. If you manage to beat him, a door will open faster in the future at the team with the best car. Piastri knows this all too well when asked about that rivalry.

''As a teammate, especially in F1, the first comparison is your teammate because we're in the same car. That would definitely be the comparison there, of course. Our relationship has been good so far. I don't see why that would change. I think we'll get along well and try and push the team forward together, because that's ultimately what we what we want to try and do, we want to try and be back to winning races. So that's the main aim and there'll be the comparisons with teammates,'' Piastri concluded.