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Oscar Piastri's former performance coach has addressed the "conspiracy theories" about McLaren potentially sabotaging the Australian to favor Lando Norris in the F1 drivers' championship battle. Piastri led the championship between Round 5 and Round 20 of the 2025 F1 season, before losing the top spot to Norris after the Mexico GP.
The 24-year-old has fared worse than his teammate in recent races. The performance gap seems to have suddenly widened, with the interval reaching a peak in Mexico. While Lando Norris took pole position with an astonishing lap and converted it into a dominant victory with a 30-second gap over P2, Oscar Piastri was around six-tenths slower in qualifying and could do no better than P5 in the race.
Many F1 fans on social media theorized that McLaren might've started sabotaging him to favor Norris. However, Piastri's former coach, Kim Keedle, who worked with him since his F2 days until last year, denied any such happenings. Shining a light on McLaren's way of operating, Keedle said on the SEN Breakfast podcast:
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"I know how McLaren operates, and they have handled this well internally. I understand how it might look suspicious externally. The difficult thing with F1, throughout the season, there is so much development going on. "
"At the start, McLaren was the fastest car and Red Bull have caught up. Mercedes and Ferrari come in and have their strong races too. Throw in some maybe lost confidence and poor races for Oscar. I don’t buy into the conspiracy theories, I think it's all above board and fair," he added.
Lando Norris' victory in Mexico gave him a one-point lead over Oscar Piastri in the drivers' championship. Max Verstappen, who finished on the podium in P3, got closer to the new leader, with a 36-point gap to the top, down from 40 (to the old leader Piastri) before Mexico.
Oscar Piastri doesn't need to 'reinvent' himself to trump Lando Norris in title battle
After the Mexico Grand Prix, Oscar Piastri shared that his recent drop in performance seemed 'strange to get his head around'. Even at the United States GP, the Aussie driver couldn't impress in the race, finishing where he started, in P5.
In Mexico, Piastri told Sky Sports that he hadn't changed his driving style since the start of the season, but the recent couple of races required a different driving approach, which he failed to ace.
"The car's obviously not changed for a while now, so it's nothing to do with the car," he said. "I think given how the pace is differentiated for the last couple of races, clearly Lando's found it a bit easier to just dial into that, and I haven't. So plenty of analysis to try and get further on top of that."
"But I think it's important to remember, for the other 19 races, the way I've been driving has been working pretty well. It's more about adding some tools to the toolbox rather than reinventing myself," the 24-year-old added.
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella explained that Oscar Piastri's drop in pace could be attributed to the track conditions in Austin and Mexico, which favored Lando Norris' style more.
