At Monza’s Grand Prix, an incident between Oscar Piastri and Lewis Hamilton surprisingly fostered mutual respect, not rivalry.
Surprisingly, this clash did not damage the relationship between the two drivers. Far from it. Lewis Hamilton sought to explain himself, with respect and clarity, to Piastri.
This incident even led Lewis Hamilton to hold the young 22-year-old McLaren driver in higher regard… as Piastri himself recounts.
“It was Mark (Webber, Piastri’s manager) who told me after Monza, ‘if he didn’t think highly of you, he wouldn’t have come and said anything after the accident,'” Piastri shares.
“I’ll take Mark’s word for it. I feel like it’s good advice or wisdom.”
“Lewis hasn’t had many incidents in his life, so it could be easy for him to brush them off, but he showed a lot of respect. Of course, I wish we hadn’t had the accident in the first place, but I had a lot of respect for him given his attitude.”
Does Piastri drive differently when facing a sports legend like Lewis Hamilton? Does he fight differently against a seven-time world champion than he would against a Kevin Magnussen or Lance Stroll, for example?
“I’ve had two accidents with Lewis, and neither time was particularly my fault, but I don’t know, maybe he just doesn’t like me, simply (laughs)!”
“With so much experience, you know they’re going to put the car in the right spot, and the strategy they work with their team is going to be solid.”
“You have to be at your absolute best to try and beat them. You also need a certain mentality – not to treat them differently and not to be biased, otherwise, you’re going to race differently against them.”
“You can race a bit more kindly, or conversely, more harshly against legends, which can be bad in both cases. So, you should treat them like any other, and I think now that I’ve been in F1 for a year, it’s much easier to do that.”
“In Saudi Arabia last year, someone showed me the starting grid chart… I thought to myself, this is my second F1 race alongside Lewis Hamilton. The year before, I watched him line up on the grid, and now I’m alongside him, which is really cool.”
Oscar Piastri is currently living his dream in F1 – and this dream will taste even sweeter this weekend, in Melbourne. The McLaren F1 driver will be racing literally 10 minutes from where he grew up.
“It’s truly a privilege to have a home race that’s as close as possible.”
“For me, when you’re so young, in karting, and even in single-seaters, F1 seems so far away and so unlikely. I never really thought about it. I remember people telling me, in karting or when I started to succeed in F4, that it would be cool to race in Melbourne one day.”
“In my head, I was thinking: ‘I don’t think that’s going to happen.’ So, for me, racing in F1 in Melbourne, it didn’t really weigh on my mind.”
“For me, the love of racing, trying to beat other people, driving fast cars, the competitive environment, all of that matters much more (in my motivation) than having a race right near my home.”
Piastri and Hamilton: Respect After Clash. Piastri and Hamilton: Respect After Clash
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