Oscar Piastri dismisses McLaren ‘sabotage’ ahead of 2026 title fight

08:00, 25 Feb

byHenry Eccles

Oscar Piastri has laughed off the idea of McLaren ‘sabotaging’ his 2025 title fight with teammate Lando Norris and Max Verstappen, with the Aussie instead focusing on “plenty of lessons learned” from the epic three-way battle.

“At no point were there any bad intentions or certainly no sabotage like I’ve seen around a few times.“

- Oscar Piastri

Piastri was ahead in the title race for most of the 2025 campaign but lost a 34-point gap to eventual champion Norris, and with so many eyes on McLaren’s team orders and costly errors towards the end of the season, some fans began to speculate whether the Woking team was favouring the British driver.

The ‘Papaya Rules’ debate even made its way to the Australian Parliament in December, after one politician raised the idea that McLaren were “biased against” Piastri.

'Certainly no sabotage' at McLaren, says Piastri

Photo: McLaren

On the topic of the parliamentary debate, Piastri spoke to Australian news outlet, 7NEWS, saying: “Yeah, I saw and I think, you know, for me, the takeaway from that was just how closely everyone was supporting it more than anything else.

“At no point were there any bad intentions or certainly no sabotage like I’ve seen around a few times,” Piastri chuckled.

Instead, the 24-year-old chose to take a positive view of what was only his third, but easily most competitive season in F1.

“You know, I think every single season is going to have its ups and downs.

“And that was certainly the case last year. But I think compared to the first couple of years of my F1 career, there was significantly more ups, which was great, and plenty of lessons learned in some of those tougher moments and tougher weekends.

“So I think for me, just acknowledging the year as a whole, I think it was a really good step forward from 2024, with still some things to work on, some things to improve. So that’s how I try and look at it.”

Piastri then previewed 2026, adding that despite the difficult end to last year’s title fight, he proved to himself that he is “good enough to win” as he seeks a first-ever F1 world title.

“You always learn more in the tougher moments or the bad moments. I think I definitely learned some lessons and things I can take forward into 2026 through that, but also, proved to myself more than anything, that when I get everything together and kind of maximise my potential, that it’s good enough to win races."

Piastri warns of major challenge at Melbourne after F1’s new rules

The first Grand Prix of 2026 takes place at Piastri’s hometown in Melbourne, although the McLaren driver has already raised some concerns that F1’s 2026 regulations will make life difficult upon his return, claiming that energy management will mean some ‘abnormal’ racing at a “harvest-limited” circuit.