Oscar Piastri carries a nine-point championship lead into the F1 summer break. But that advantage has been falling in recent races.

After Lando Norris hit his McLaren teammate and crashed out of the Canadian GP, Piastri was a season-high 22 points clear. But Norris has won three out of four races since.

While Piastri’s victory at Spa stopped Norris from building too much momentum, it’s the Australian who will be more relieved that the season has paused. The two drivers were involved in a gripping battle at the Hungarian GP last time out.

Photo by Mark Sutton – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images
With Norris on an alternative one-stop strategy, Piastri chased him down on fresher tyres. The two drivers almost came together when the second-place man attempted an audacious lunge into turn one, but that was the closest he got to the sister car.

Oscar Piastri’s recent comments show he’s becoming ‘agitated’ at McLaren

Speaking to AS Colombia, former McLaren driver Juan Pablo Montoya stressed that Piastri and Norris, for all their talent, might not have another chance to win the title. Suppliers Mercedes are believed to have the best ICE for the 2026 season, but there is uncertainty over the batteries as the sport goes 50% electric.

Even if the Mercedes power unit is the best in class overall, there’s no guarantee that Rob Marshall and co. will nail the ‘completely new’ challenge. It’s possible that a rival designer, like Adrian Newey at Aston Martin, has developed a game-changing ‘theory’.

Montoya, who won seven races but missed out on a championship, thinks Piastri is beginning to understand the importance of maximising his opportunity this year. That much is evident from his ‘agitated’ comments.

After he lost victory at the British GP due to a penalty for a safety car infringement, a seething Piastri said he’d be in ‘trouble’ if he gave his honest reaction. And during the race in Budapest, he told his team he didn’t ‘care’ about polesitter Charles Leclerc – beating Norris was his only concern.

“Nobody guarantees that McLaren will be the best car next year,” Montoya explained. “It’s a new regulation with new theories. Everything is completely new. It could be that McLaren go out and win everything, or we could get to next year and McLaren won’t make the top 10.

“The reality is that Oscar and Lando could now have their only chance to be world champion. It causes a bit of drama. They got along very well and everything, but I’m telling you, look at Oscar.

“His comments are getting heated, he’s getting agitated. One [Norris] is trying to get back on track, and the other is trying to stay on the rails.”

Oscar Piastri’s race engineer reveals how his demeanour has changed amid Lando Norris McLaren duel

According to Zak Brown, Piastri has never had any issue with Norris. Indeed, his frustrations in recent races have been external.

Norris was allowed to diverge on strategy in Hungary, but there were no complaints from driver #81. He knows he’ll benefit from that freedom later in the season.

The consensus is that tension will increase during the final 10 races, particularly given that Max Verstappen, the only driver who briefly had hope of beating the McLarens, has now fallen out of realistic contention.

In private, Tom Stallard has noted Piastri’s greater ‘intensity’ in their conversations, and the same is true of Norris with his engineer, Will Joseph. The two drivers still appear to be getting on for the moment, which is a testament to their mutual respect and the culture at McLaren.