Oscar Piastri recently traded in his McLaren Formula 1 car for the world of Australian V8 Supercars. Returning to his Aussie roots, the 24-year-old joined fellow countryman and Supercars driver and 18-time race winner Cam Waters.
“To be honest, I probably watched the V8s more than I watched F1 because the time difference was a lot kinder. Used to watch the drag races here with my dad,” Piastri revealed.
The trackday presented a unique learning curve for the F1 driver, who admitted he initially had “no idea how the car works or where the track goes.”
After his first few laps in Waters’ machinery, Piastri was encouraged to “take a bit more kerb” after “being very polite”. He quickly took on the challenge and kerb-hopped the Ford Mustang resulting in smiles from those watching.
“It’s good fun. Nice to drive something new. First time driving a race car with a roof on it,” Piastri said.
Piastri turned his shaky start to the 2026 F1 season around with a second-place finish at the Japanese Grand Prix. The race at the Suzuka circuit was Piastri’s first grand prix start of the year after he crashed on the reconnaissance lap in Australia and faced an electrical issue ahead of his Chinese campaign.
“In the race, yeah, there wasn’t anything more we could have done,” he said after the race.
Oscar Piastri, McLaren
Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images
“We got a good start, the pace was good, I felt like I was strategic or smart with how I used the boost and how I managed that side of racing.
“Our strategy was good, we didn’t blink too early. Obviously, the safety car was a shame, but I think as race weekends go we couldn’t have done any better than that. So yeah, for me I’m very happy with the performance that I put in, very happy with the performance from the whole team.
“Clearly, we’ve still got some, firstly, performance to find, but also Lando’s side of the garage was a pretty interrupted weekend with all the issues, and clearly the start of the season has not been easy for us with reliability, so we’ve got a long way to go.
“But yeah, I think we showed that if we get everything as good as we can get it, then we can cause a few headaches.”
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