Oscar Piastri doesn’t think he could have passed Oliver Bearman in F1 Mexico GP, as he notes he had to have a go at George Russell at any cost.
Starting in seventh, McLaren’s Piastri had no choice but make as much headway as possible in F1 Mexico GP. But it wasn’t the best of runs to kick-off as he was still behind the Mercedes pair. Additionally, he lost out to Haas’ Bearman, who got the better of several in the leading cars.
In fact, the Brit was up to third at point before settling for fourth. Towards the end, Piastri chased him and got ever close until the Virtual Safety Car arrived. It seemed like the VSC helped Bearman, but the Australian conceded that he probably wouldn’t have gotten him in those two laps.
Piastri had to work hard to get behind Bearman after passing both Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Russell. The Italian was fairly easy to get by, but with the Brit, it was a bit tasty. “It would have been very, very tough [to pass Bearman],” he said to media. “It was one thing getting into DRS, and then it was another thing trying to overtake, so I’m not sure it made much difference in the end.
“With George, I mean, I had to go for it in the end. I tried a couple of times to kind of bide my time through the first sequence of corners and try and get him into Turn 4, but yeah, it was like every time you tried that they put quicksand down, because you just had no grip, so very difficult to do that, and I just had to go for it, and in the end it wasn’t too difficult.
“Looking ahead, difficult to know what to expect, the pace of the car has been strong. We haven’t been able to unlock it that much, we will learn if there are some things to learn, we changed things and if we made progress with that and feel like I have, then I’ll be relatively happy, if not, then back to drawing board,” summed up Piastri, who lost his points lead to race winner Lando Norris by one point.
The gap to Max Verstappen also shrunk with four races to go. On the strategy side, there was nothing more McLaren could have done as per team boss Andrea Stella. He didn’t think one-stop was possible in the end, unlike Norris and Charles Leclerc, who were ahead of the pack and could manage things.
Piastri had nothing to lose from behind and so, it was slightly easier to undertake two stops and press the drivers ahead into stopping as well. “Well, Oscar, first of all, the idea with Oscar was to try and put him in free air and try to utilise the performance that was available on Oscar’s car,” said Stella to media.
“If Oscar had stayed out, very likely Russell would have stayed out, who was ahead of Oscar. So the fact that everyone ended up on a two-stop is also because cars ahead covered the cars behind. So it was a little bit of a controlling strategy and that’s why you end up with a group of cars that are on the same strategy. I think the fact that with Lando and Leclerc, they had enough space to actually, once again, control what was happening behind them and there was no reason to go on a two-stop.
“The start then was, it seemed to be quite committed, but it was also in a position in which nobody needed to cover it. So I think it’s not necessarily for Oscar committing to one or two, but probably it was more about trying to find some free air for Oscar to express his potential,” summed up Stella.
Here’s Oscar Piastri passing Mercedes: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2025-mexico-city-grand-prix-piastri-jumps-ahead-of-antonelli-with-super-quick-pit-stop.1847084776129025842
Here’s how F1 Mexico GP panned out
Here’s Lando Norris on boos
Here’s Mercedes drivers on trying to hold Oscar Piastri
