The hallmarks of an F1 world champion Oscar Piastri showed in Baku

Oscar Piastri claimed his second grand prix victory with what was surely the best drive of his impressive yet fledgeling F1 career in Baku.

The McLaren driver, sharing the front row of the grid with four-time Azerbaijan Grand Prix pole winner Charles Leclerc, stalked the Ferrari throughout the opening stages of Sunday’s 51-lap race before pulling off an audacious pass on Lap 20.

Piastri “hung on for dear life” over the next 31 laps to secure his second grand prix victory of the season with a performance he felt “definitely goes down as one of my better races of my career”.

En route to his stunning win, the Australian, who is still only 23, demonstrated attributes that surprised even his McLaren team, and showed he is an F1 world champion in the making.

Precision and execution 

Piastri’s overtake on Leclerc was phenomenal. From a seemingly-impossible distance, the McLaren driver brilliantly and bravely lunged his car down the inside of the Monegasque at Turn 1.

The spectacular divebomb appeared to catch Leclerc totally by surprise, but it was judged and executed to perfection by Piastri. There was no panic or out-of-control moment. He didn’t lock up or run too wide, nor did he make contact with either his rival or the barriers.

As Piastri declared himself, it was “what won me the race”. He revealed he had ignored his race engineer Tom Stallard’s advice to bring his tyres in gently during the first stint by going for the overtake. Piastri knew it was now or never, and his killer instinct took over.

“I felt a bit sorry for my race engineer because I basically tried to do that in the first stint and completely cooked my tyres,” he said. “So my engineer came on the radio and said, ‘let's not do that again’, basically. I completely ignored him the next lap and sent it down the inside.

“If I didn't take that opportunity then I was never going to have another one. Credit to Charles, he was incredibly fair. I think maybe he thought I was going to sail on into the run-off but I was pleasantly surprised that I actually made the corner.

“It was a high-risk, high-commitment move but that’s what I needed to do to try and win the race because I wasn't really going to be that keen to finish second. So I had to try.”

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella admitted he had doubted whether Piastri would be able to pull off the manoeuvre from such a long way back.

"When I watched the move live and I saw him going to the inside, my instinct said he is going to go long," Stella said. "But that's why I want to emphasise the precision Oscar showed in the execution on the inside apex kerb in corner one. I was surprised by the move, but Oscar is always surprising us with his talent and ability.”

Intelligent defending

Immediately after snatching first place, attack switched to defence mode, with Piastri covering off Leclerc on the short blast to Turn 2. In order to secure the win, Piastri had to keep Leclerc at bay for 31 laps and resist several attempts from the Ferrari man to seize back the lead.

Despite Leclerc repeatedly having the aid of DRS, Piastri forced his rival to the outside of Turn 1 on each occasion he looked to power past. A combination of how Piastri positioned his car, as well as the strong traction from his McLaren while exiting Turn 1, ultimately proved crucial to thwarting Leclerc.

Asked if Piastri’s defence against Leclerc highlighted the strengths of McLaren’s car or their driver, Stella replied: “I think it is a combination. Ninety percent is Oscar’s judgement and the most difficult one is the first one, because when you do the first of these kinds of manoeuvres, actually you don’t have references.

“So I think after the first one he would have found references and later on it became easier for him. But when you do it the first time you have to judge things very precisely not to be undercut on the way to Turn 2 or the next DRS zone to Turn 3.

“I think where the car comes to Oscar’s advantage is that the car has good traction. We know that our rear end is good, especially when you are around 100 km/h or more, which is where you are in Turn 1. And I think this is definitely something Oscar did exploit, but it wouldn’t have worked without precision from a driving point of view.”

Mental strength under pressure

Piastri described Sunday’s race as the “most stressful afternoon” of his life - not that you would have known from the outside. He was measured and collected behind the steering wheel, displaying the kind of unflappable nature we have now come to expect from him.

Aside from an eye-catching synchronised slide out of the final corner with Leclerc on Lap 42 - demonstrating just how hard both drivers were pushing around Baku’s unforgiving streets in the pursuit of victory - and a couple of slight glances with the barriers, no obvious mistake was made.

It was Piastri’s mental resilience, under intense pressure while driving one of the most challenging circuits on the calendar, which impressed McLaren the most.

"I would say today he also gave a demonstration of his mental strength,” Stella said. “He drove like a driver with a lot of experience who has been under this kind of pressure before.

“That he can look at one eye with the mirror and the other at where the braking point is and he did it again and again with a great level of precision and very controlled, even when he was talking on the radio he was very under control. So a phenomenal driver and a brilliant drive today.”

Piastri, who claimed back-to-back titles in F3 and F2 on his meteoric rise to F1, acknowledged this was the defining drive of his relatively-short career to date: “I think that ranks as probably the best win of my career.”

The ominous concern for his rivals, including McLaren teammate Lando Norris, is that Piastri is only going to get better from here.