Piastri levels Ricciardo with eighth win at rain-soaked Belgian GP

Doubling his championship lead by mastering the changing conditions across the Belgian Grand Prix weekend, Oscar Piastri has now matched Daniel Ricciardo’s tally of eight career Formula 1 victories, firmly establishing himself among Australia’s racing elite at Spa.

At just 24 years of age, Piastri is also just one win away from equalling his manager, Mark Webber’s tally of nine, with his commanding win in Belgium marking yet another triumph for the championship leader as the season enters the latter half.

The crucial 25 points that come with standing atop the podium not only extended Piastri’s lead in the championship — a figure that doubled to 16 points across the Belgian Grand Prix Sprint weekend — but also stretched his streak of consecutive points finishes to 30 in just his third year on the grid.

Achieving such a feat didn’t come easy for the Australian, despite the #81 snatching the lead on the opening lap of the damp race.

“It was a tough race,” the Australian admitted.

“Difficult conditions at the start and then just trying to manage the Inters firstly because it was drying relatively quickly, but you can kill the Inters in a lap or two if you really want around here, so that was a bit tricky. 

“And then I felt good on the Mediums for about five laps, and then when I could see that the Hard on Lando’s car was not worse than the Medium, I was a bit nervous considering we had nearly 25 laps to go at that point. 

“So, I had to be a bit careful, but it held on in the end much better than I feared. 

“I had to manage a bit, but nothing special.”

Heavy rainfall was unrelenting when it came time to start the Belgian Grand Prix, prompting Race Control to delay the start of the race for over an hour as weather conditions eased up.

When the field had been given the go-ahead to return to the circuit, Piastri offered his initial thoughts on the conditions, informing his pit wall that the track was “quite a lot better than before”.

Sitting in second position on intermediate tyres, the Australian added that “after Eau Rouge [was] still quite bad”, with the poor conditions flowing onto the Kemmel Straight while the field lapped behind the Aston Martin Safety Car.

The Safety Car returned to the pitlane after four laps of setting the pace, instating Lando Norris as the leader when they rounded to Bus Stop Chicane for a rolling start on Lap 5 of the Belgian Grand Prix.

The Brit’s time in the lead was fleeting, with Piastri instantly working to dispose of his teammate within the first four corners of the Circuit de Spa Francorchamps, aided by the significant slipstream advantage when he flew by Norris — faulting concerns regarding his battery pack — on the Kemmel Straight.

Building a margin of over a second, the Australian didn’t face any retaliation from Norris, who settled into second place.

“I knew [a first lap overtake] was going to help me pretty significantly,” Piastri said.

“I had a good run out of Turn 1 and then tried to be as brave as I could through Eau Rouge and was able to stay pretty close. 

“After that, the slipstream did the rest for me. 

“I knew that was going to be pretty important for trying to win the race today.”

With a dry line forming, the crossover to the slick compound tyre arrived on Lap 12 for the Australian, who pitted from the lead of the race to relinquish his overworked intermediate tyres.

Piastri rejoined the race on the medium compound tyre, exiting the pitlane 19 seconds behind his teammate after having had preferential treatment from the McLaren pit crew, due to the fact that the #81 and #4’s on-track proximity meant double-stacking wasn’t a viable option for the team.

On the following lap, Norris was called into make his first and only stop of the race, opting to sport the hard compound tyre with the certain mission to run to the end of the C1 — a strategy that was still up in the air for the medium tyre runners as the conditions left much unknown.

“We’d spoken about [using the hard tyre] before the race,” Piastri said.

“It was quite a late decision to pit on the lap we did, but there’s risks either way. 

“If I was in Lando’s position, I probably would have done the same thing. 

“At that point, it seemed like the safest thing to do was go on the Medium, because the Hard is two steps harder here. 

“You don’t know how it’s going to react in those conditions. 

“If there’s a Safety Car, which often there is in those conditions, then you probably want a Medium, not a Hard. 

“There are risks both ways, but ultimately I’m happy with what we did.”

As the race ticked over the halfway point, Piastri had a leading margin that ebbed and flowed around the eight-second mark, though his teammate, despite running a different compound, continued to push the Australian as he recorded the then-fastest lap of the race.

Lucky for the #81, however, Norris started to trip up in the damp conditions, the first error arriving through Turn 12, where he was forced to counter-steer to correct his sliding MCL39, increasing his average lap time by 1.2 seconds.

Norris lost a further six-tenths after he locked his front tyres into the braking zone at La Source, before his race engineer, Will Joseph, alerted the #4 to the need to manage his tyres across the final ten laps of the race.

The interval resumed its post at eight seconds with ten more tours of the Circuit de Spa Francorchamps remaining, before Norris stepped it under a notch, gaining five-tenths per lap across the next four laps while the Australian approached the first back-marker, Isack Hadjar.

With two laps remaining, the #4 once again locked up into La Source, costing him 1.2 seconds on his hunt of his championship-leading teammate — the nail in the coffin for his Belgian Grand Prix hopes as Piastri unleashed two personal best laps to round out the race.

The ultimate margin between the teammates levelled out to 3.4 seconds as they took the chequered flag, returning to McLaren with mixed emotions on an overwhelmingly positive day with a dominant 1-2 finish.

“Nicely done. Nicely f******g done,” the chuffed 24-year-old cheered over the team radio, increasing his championship lead to 16 points after outscoring his teammate in both points-scoring events in Belgium.

Now level with Daniel Ricciardo on Formula 1 victories, Piastri and the rest of the paddock will make the quick trip to Budapest for the Hungarian Grand Prix — the event where the Australian claimed his maiden career victory in 2024, albeit in slightly controversial fashion.

“I’m really excited to go back, it’s always a fun weekend,” the #81 said.

“It’s a great city, a cool track as well.

“I’m sure Thursday will be nice to go back to where I had my first win, but as soon as we get on track, you forget about that immediately. 

“It’ll be cool, but I’ll enjoy today for a bit first.”

The final race weekend before the summer break will run across August 01-03, and with the weekend returning to a conventional schedule, the first of three practice sessions will kick off at 21:30 AEST on Friday, August 01.

Image: Formula 1

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