Oscar Piastri reveals the ‘most surprising’ thing about his F1 championship lead over Lando Norris

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Oscar Piastri goes to the 2025 Italian Grand Prix at Monza this weekend boasting the biggest lead in the F1 drivers’ championship this year at 34 points over Lando Norris.

The Australian started this season facing a 23-point deficit to his McLaren teammate back in March. Piastri spun out of second place in the Australian Grand Prix before recovering to P9, while Norris won. But the 24-year-old took just 35 days to take control and has not let it slip.

Norris has moved within three, eight and nine points of Piastri at various points of the 2025 F1 season so far. Yet the 25-year-old’s retirement in last Sunday’s Dutch Grand Prix leaves him with a 34-point mountain to climb to return to the top of the F1 drivers’ championship.

A broken oil fitting caused Norris’ retirement from the Dutch GP, while running in P2 behind Piastri in the lead. Without Norris’ second DNF of the campaign after he crashed into Piastri in Canada, the Briton would trail the Melbourne native by 16 points ahead of the Italian GP.

Oscar Piastri finds his Grand Prix win tally ‘the most surprising’ part of his 2025 championship lead

Norris was seldom able to present a genuine threat for the lead at Zandvoort, as Piastri won the Dutch GP for his seventh victory in the first 15 rounds. McLaren have seen Norris secure five wins, while Max Verstappen of Red Bull has two and Mercedes’ George Russell has one.

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Piastri’s wins also total 77.7% of his career tally, having won the 2024 Hungarian Grand Prix and Azerbaijan Grand Prix for his only victories before this term. And Piastri now notes that scoring seven wins to date is the “most surprising” aspect of his third season on the F1 grid.

Piastri told the BBC: “The gap to everyone else and the amount of wins, that’s probably the most surprising one, because I’ve won, what, five more races this year than I had my whole career. Admittedly, it’s been a short career.

“But to have that many wins and to have a car and a team that’s been so dominant, that’s been the biggest surprise.”

Oscar Piastri has scored 77.7% of his F1 career Grand Prix wins in 2025

While McLaren’s debacle issuing team orders overshadowed Piastri’s first F1 win in the 2024 Hungarian GP, he got the headlines later last term in Baku for his second win. Piastri ignored McLaren to win the 2024 Azerbaijan GP with a bold overtake on Ferrari rival Charles Leclerc.

Now, the 2025 season has seen Piastri utilise having the best car on the grid to win seven of the first 15 Grands Prix ahead of the Italian GP this Sunday. Piastri scored his first F1 pole in China this March, as well, before scoring pole in Bahrain, Imola, Spain and the Netherlands.

The Australian has even only failed to win from pole at the 2025 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix to date. Verstappen, who trails Piastri by 104 points as the Dutchman’s reign of four-straight drivers’ titles looks set to end, overtook the McLaren man at Turn 2 on Lap 1 to win at Imola.

Roles were reversed between the McLaren and Red Bull duo in round five, when Piastri won the Saudi Arabian GP after polesitter Verstappen received his five-second penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage. Piastri has also won in Miami and Belgium this season.