Oscar Piastri has given his assessment of his sophomore season in F1, with the Australian believing that he has shown “pretty clear progress” from his rookie campaign whilst also suggesting that he “made life too difficult” for himself in certain areas during 2024.
While McLaren endured a tough start to 2023 when Piastri made his debut on the grid with the papaya team, their fortunes improved as that year progressed, allowing the youngster to end the season with two podiums under his belt as well as a victory in the Qatar Sprint.
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Entering into 2024, McLaren’s ascent continued throughout the campaign and Piastri scored his first Grand Prix win in Hungary, a feat he followed up with by securing another P1 in Azerbaijan. This saw the 23-year-old end the drivers’ championship in fourth place, while his results helped the Woking outfit to secure their first constructors’ title since 1998.
Taking those final results out of the equation, Piastri has given an overall positive assessment of his second season in the sport whilst recognising that there are still some areas in which he hopes to improve going forward.
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“I think [2024 has been] a good improvement from my rookie season, but still room to go,” the two-time race winner said during the final race weekend of the year in Abu Dhabi.
“I think a few races at the start of the season, a few races more recently have not gone as well as I would have liked. I think also as a team, there’s some races through the year that we would have liked to have executed a bit better.
“But I think, especially in the middle part of the year, I was very happy with the level I was performing at, and I think I showed some pretty clear progress from last season.”
Piastri believes that he showed «pretty clear progress» in 2024 following on from his rookie season
In terms of where he feels that he could have performed better, Piastri cited qualifying as one of these areas.
“I think mainly in qualifying, I’ve made life too difficult for myself this year,” he explained. “But I think last year in a lot of the races, I wouldn’t have had the tools to get back through, whereas this year, I feel like I have.
“So I think on a personal note, it’s been a good improvement. But yeah, still some room to go.”
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