How Piastri pounced at Spa to strike back in F1 title fight against Norris

Most of the great descriptors pertaining to Oscar Piastri have an “un-” prefix in common. Unflappable. Unerring. Unflinching. Unit? In the Australian slang sense, maybe not physically – but he’s certainly becoming a metaphorical one as he grows into this title battle. And, although his disappointments over the weekend came on Saturday, Piastri had already foreshadowed the events of both races on the Friday after sprint qualifying.

“Spa's probably one of the worst places to have pole position”, the Australian mused after roaring to the usually coveted grid spot in sprint qualifying by almost half a second. 

And so, that prescience was proven correct, predicting his own downfall as Max Verstappen took advantage of the hole Piastri punched in the air at the start of the sprint race. The Dutchman’s low-drag aero package ensured there would be no reversal across the remainder of the 15-lap run-time. 

But Piastri was also the arbiter of his own rise to the lead in the greater of the two races, as a Turn 14 mistake during his qualifying lap cost him a chance of pole – a mistake that was probably to his benefit. As this ensured that team-mate Lando Norris could offer a lovely slipstream through Eau Rouge and Raidillon, Piastri took the initiative with great gusto and performed a slide-rule pass around the outside on the Kemmel Straight to break into the lead. 

Piastri’s commitment on the throttle through Eau Rouge and Norris’ snatch at La Source made this possible, despite the fact that Norris had the advantage as the FIA had decreed that the rain-delayed race would begin with a rolling start. In a roundabout sort of way, the Belgian Grand Prix very much delivered the expected result had the race been dry – and in essence, it very much was a dry race despite the hour-plus faffing under cover of awning as the rain subsided, then returned. 

After the formation lap, the race director chose to suspend the starting procedure and threw a red flag, as visibility was poor. With a few laps of running behind the Aston Martin safety car, it surely would have improved, but the impending arrival of a second, high-intensity rain cell put the FIA in mind that it should wait it out and pick up later on.

One formation lap behind the safety car and then 80 minutes of waiting stalled the start of the Belgian GP

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Sutton Images via Getty Images

Many, if not most, in the paddock groaned. Why not start now, and stop later if the situation demands it? One can understand the eagerness to get going, and it did feel like the conditions could have been raceable, but the recent history of Spa-Francorchamps and the onset of low-grip conditions does tend to encourage a cautious approach. Most were concerned that F1 would have another Spa 2021 on its hands, the contentious race where spectators saw nothing but three laps behind the safety car. Yet, the weather radars knew best – and no rain was forthcoming after this incoming downpour.

Once the race had begun an hour and 20 minutes after it was supposed to, did the frustration truly arrive; the circuit appeared to be drying quickly, but the safety car was arguably out for two more laps than required. It was almost bone dry by the time the race actually got going, aside from wisps of spray pulled from deep within the asphalt by the limpet-like suction of a Pirelli race tyre. 

As green-flag running opened for business on the fifth lap, Piastri immediately sought to break Norris’ serve – perhaps seeking to demonstrate his own comments on the trials and tribulations involved in starting from pole. Norris tried to gun the throttle halfway through Blanchimont on the rolling start, but Piastri kept with him and ensured he was close to his team-mate's gearbox at Turn 1.

"When I watched the onboard back, it didn't look quite as scary as it felt in the car. I knew that I had to be very committed to pull that off" Oscar Piastri

Norris had a moment of oversteer through La Source, sapping his momentum as he looked to charge up the hill and escape Piastri’s clutches. But the championship leader was, at this juncture, very much in the box seat.

“I knew that lap one was going to be probably my best chance of winning the race,” Piastri reflected. “I got a good exit out of Turn 1 and lifted as little as I dared through Eau Rouge and that was enough. 

“I had a good restart in general. I was close into the last chicane, had an okay run out of the last chicane and then a good exit out of Turn 1. The move through Eau Rouge, I knew it was going to be by far my best opportunity to try and win the race. I'd been thinking about it for a while, put it that way. 

“Obviously, in those conditions, it's a little bit more difficult than if it's dry. I knew that I had to try and do that. When I watched the onboard back, it didn't look quite as scary as it felt in the car. I knew that I had to be very committed to pull that off.”

Piastri took his chance for the lead on the first lap of green-flag running

Photo by: Michael Potts / Motorsport Images

Over the radio, Norris queried if there was a battery issue that he needed to be aware of; Piastri surged past and then began to gap his team-mate with apparent ease; the Briton then had Charles Leclerc and Verstappen firmly in his mirrors. Engineer Will Joseph duly informed him that the energy had been deployed on the restart and that he’d recoup it in due course, very much suggesting that this wasn’t a driver-influenced decision.

Once Norris had stabilised, he hoped to remain a threat to Piastri and stayed just outside of a second’s gap. As has been customary throughout 2025, particularly in recent weeks, the orange cars slipped into the distance and out of view like a heavy sunset. Leclerc’s struggles in the damper conditions and continued defence against Verstappen – whose higher-downforce set-up was stronger in the wet - ensured the papaya cars were over 10 seconds clear of the Ferrari by the time the field began to pit for dry tyres.

Lewis Hamilton was the guinea pig, followed by the likes of Pierre Gasly, Nico Hulkenberg, and Fernando Alonso, as the quartet took the gamble on the medium compound. Evidently, their half-laps were enough to convince the rest of the field; it was time for slicks, and Piastri led Leclerc and Verstappen into the pitlane. Norris, who remained within two seconds of Piastri, stayed out for an extra lap. The price for losing the lead was an extortionate one.

Norris’ side of the garage chose to do something different to Piastri, by fitting the hard tyre and effectively guaranteeing that the car would make it to the end without another stop. The Melburnian, who had taken the medium compound, had a much more difficult job of massaging his C3s to the very end. Game on? If Norris could make up for the time loss incurred by stopping a lap later (plus a slow pitstop, owing to a fumbled front-left), then sure.

Although Norris could push a little bit more freely, there was a sense of urgency in his driving. He wasn’t in a free-flowing state of transfixion; the notion of letting the car do the work and letting the gap come to him was not altogether present in his approach to the second stint. Instead, Norris was pushing, and over-pushing at that; the subconscious awareness of every facet of the car was drowned out in favour of simply closing down Piastri at all costs.

And for a time, this worked; Norris got the gap down to 7.8 seconds and shrinking – but then went too deep at Pouhon and cost himself 1.2s in the aftermath. He gritted his teeth, and tried again; over the next eight laps, the gap came down to 7.2s, but Norris locked up at La Source and shipped 0.8s - it was a smaller loss, but one he could scarcely afford. 

Joseph had to get on the ol’ blower and tell Norris to stop overdriving. He needed to cut through here and pull Norris out of his self-fulfilling cycle: Build the laps. Let them come to you. Piastri’s tyres are getting old and yours are still relatively okay.

Norris was overdriving in his pursuit of Piastri and it cost him the chance to attack late on

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Sutton Images via Getty Images

To Norris’ credit, he rallied and began to take some serious chunks of time out of Piastri’s lead – 7.9s became 6.9s, became 5.5s, and falling. Was the return of Last Lap Lando, the driver formerly known as a prolific overtaker at the death of a race, in the offing? To win, he’d need to recapture past glories – instead, he only grasped a bouquet of erstwhile faults – or oopsie-daisies.

Norris had torn the lead down to 3.1s, so if Piastri faltered for any reason, he’d be there at the end. But almost in a moment of self-defeat, Norris locked up at La Source again – and the race stopped flowing from that moment onwards. 

Conversely, let’s look at the race from Piastri’s perspective – he had a difficult job to do, but one to which he could devote his full attention in getting the mediums to the end. There were moments where it looked a little dicey but, in maintaining a steady pace, forced Norris to start trying too hard to catch up. Piastri operates on a basis of “never interfere with the enemy while he is in the process of making a mistake”, and he let Norris hoist himself upon his own petard – twice, in fact.

This year's Belgian GP demonstrated the advances that Piastri has made in tyre management terms. In 2023-spec, he might have needed that extra stop; coaxing the mediums into lasting for a 32-lap stint might have been beyond Piastri in his formative F1 years

“I felt good on the mediums for about five laps,” Piastri explained. “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. 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.”

Norris had no regrets, however, and felt that the hard-tyre strategy was the better option and that he’d given it a good go. “The last few laps, I had the advantage in terms of grip, but it was not a great pitstop, I was the second one to stop. I think I lost eight, nine seconds just by being the second car to box. To catch Oscar from that gap is quite an achievement. I gave it a good shot, but just not close enough.”

It should also be said that this year's Belgian GP demonstrated the advances that Piastri has made in tyre management terms. In 2023-spec, he might have needed that extra stop; coaxing the mediums into lasting for a 32-lap stint might have been beyond Piastri in his formative F1 years. As other teams consider drivers as expendable, he's proven how drivers can grow - if given the requisite time to do so.

Given the sensibilities of the two McLaren drivers, Spa-Francorchamps feels like more of a Piastri circuit; the higher-speed corners and rewards for commitment lean towards the Australian’s style. The Hungaroring, with its rear-limited nature and low-speed corners, should be a bit more of a Norris venue – and he’ll need it to be, if he’s to have any hope of going into the summer break with the championship lead.

Piastri has grown his championship lead over Norris to 16 points

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