Last Updated on March 14 2025, 3:37 pm
The eyes of the F1 world have been on Lewis Hamilton as he debuts for the iconic Ferrari team in the season opener in Melbourne this weekend. Hamilton along with Fernando Alonso are the senior statement of the sport with them both now in their 40’s.
By way of contrast a quarter of the field in Melbourne are starting their first full time seasons in Formula One. Ahead of them in terms of experience is McLaren’s Oscar Piastri now starting his third full year in the sport.
In the build up to the Australian GP, McLaren announced a new “multi-year deal” for the young Australian, who was out of contract come the end of this year. Zak Brown talks about giving Oscar some “long term security” yet as Lewis Hamilton proved, the phrase “multi-year deal” may not be as it seems.
Piastri new McLaren contract
Piastri will now be contracted to the end of 2026 although a variety of clauses in his contract probably don’t guarantee him much more than that. With Lando Norris, the pre-season favourite to win the drivers’ F1 title, Piastri knows he is in a car capable of giving him a lath to the championship.
Yet De Telegraaf now reports Brown’s confidence in his young Australian driver, may not be quite as clear cut as he made out. Prior to the new Piastri contract being announced, Brown approached Red Bull to enquire about the availability of Verstappen. The Dutch champion is contracted to Red Bull Racing until 2028, but Christian Horner stated last year he would not stand in his way should he wish to leave his Red Bull home.
Red Bull are not amongst the favourites for titles this season following a disjointed pre-season test in Bahrain. The first two practice sessions in Australia would also suggests it is Ferrari and McLaren who should be fighting it out for poles and Grand Prix wins.
Yet Verstappen is attempting to achieve a feat only Michael Schumacher has delivered, by winning five consecutive F1 drivers’ championships with the same team. Come next year, Red Bull will attempt to do something never even attempted in F1 history as they evolve from a customer team for engines into one which designs and builds their own.
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Verstappen. biding his time
With Ford partnering the Milton Keynes outfit in their power unit adventure, there remains hope that Red Bull Powertrains will be competing along with Ferrari and Mercedes. With the uncertainty of which engine will come out on top, its understandable Verstappen will remain with Red Bull Racing, whom he has made his own.
Guru F1 car designer Adrian Newey believes 2026 will see F1 become an engine dominated sport once again, even if for just 2-3 seasons. Verstappen has received public overtures from both Mercedes and Aston Martin and now McLaren have shown their interest in prising the world champion away from Red Bull.
How Ferrari would react were Max to express an interest in joining the Scuderia in 2027 is unclear. Charles Leclerc is the team’s home grown protege and Lewis Hamilton has also allegedly signed a “multi-year” deal.
Despite the behind the scenes rumblings about how McLaren will handle their intra-team driver rivalry this year, Oscar Piastri is confident that the turbulence of last year’s team orders have been reset now the start of a new season of racing is under way.
McLaren reset team orders for 2025
“I’m pretty confident in what I can do. I’m aware that there’s things I need to do better from last season, but I’m confident that we’ve done a lot of hard work to try and improve that and go and have a good year,” said the Aussie after Friday practice in Melbourne.
McLaren were criticised for not issuing team orders to support Norris’ chase of Verstappen in the 2024 drivers’ title race and Piastri further ruined his chances with a risky overtake on lap one of the Italian Grand Prix. When pressed on how the team’s would manage the rules of engagement between their drivers this season, Piastri was clear.
“We’re starting from a clean slate, and ultimately whoever is going to be faster out on track is going to be who wins, or whoever finishes higher if it’s not winning,” he said.
“We’re very much clear on how we’re going into the season, and that’s racing each other and trying to hopefully fight for wins. It’s all very clear and we’ve discussed a lot of it from last season and how we managed the backend of last year, and I think this year we’re starting from zero again, we’re both going to be trying our best to win.”
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Red Bull’s interest in Piastri
The team did finally back Lando Norris towards the end of last year, but as Piastri explains the tally of which McLaren driver should be favoured has been reset to zero. Red Bull expressed an interest in Oscar Piastri as reported by Lawrence Baretto on f1.com.
Dr. Helmut Marko also told F1-insider that “Mark Webber is intensively seeking conversation” with the team back in October of 2024, while Sky Germany commentator Sascha Roos reiterated Red Bull’s interest in Piastri in December.
The recently released Netflix Drive to Survive series based on last seasons F1 competition further added to this speculation when Red Bull boss Christian Horner was asked which McLaren driver he’d prefer to sign to which he replied “Piastri, without hesitation
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Horner prefers Piastri to Norris
To that end, when Red Bull team principal Christian Horner was asked which McLaren driver he’d prefer to sign to his own team in season seven of Netflix’s Drive to Survive, he opted for Piastri without hesitation.
Mark Webber knows all too well once an F1 driver gets nominally labelled as a number two, the team begin to favour his team mate as happened with Webber and Vettel during the German’s championship winning years.
One or other of the McLaren pair will find themselves ahead of the other after the early rounds of F1 in 2025 and at some point Zak Brown and Andreas Stella will decide to support either Pastry or Norris in their bid for a first drivers’ championship since Lewis Hamilton back in 2008.
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The Formula One season roared into life properly down under in Melbourne as the Friday practice sessions got under way. For F1 fans there is plenty of intrigue to follow this year given the number of driver moves since the end of last season.
Carlos Sainz is now at a resurgent Williams who many F1 analysts believed were the fifth quickest team in testing. As the day evolved in the Australian sun it became quickly evident the Spaniard was quickly up to pace as he and team mate Alex Albon finished the second session just outside the top ten and with identical lap times.
The Racing Bulls were to challenge the Williams claim to be the best of the rest with Yuki Tsunoda in P4 and his rookie team mate Isaac Hadjar two spots further back behind the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton…. READ MORE
With over 30 years of experience in Formula 1 as an insider journalist, I have built trusted connections across the paddock, from race engineers and mechanics to senior team figures. At The Judge 13, I and a handful of trusted colleagues share exclusive Formula 1 news, expert analysis and behind-the-scenes stories you will not find in mainstream motorsport media.
