Oscar Piastri: "It's a great feeling to win one of my favourite races.

"I knew Lap One was probably my best chance of winning, so I committed and managed to make it work, which I am proud of. We then managed the rest of the race really well. I struggled a bit towards the end of the Medium, but I felt we had it under control. Thank you to the team for giving us a great car this weekend. I'm excited for Hungary."

Lando Norris: "A good result for the team and another one-two, our first here this century so it's nice to bring that back to the team. There are plenty of positives I can take from my race, and I'll review everything with my engineers before we head to Hungary. Overall, a well-deserved result for everyone involved and a solid performance for the whole team all weekend."

Andrea Stella: "A brilliant 1-2 finish to complete a very strong weekend for the team with consistent performances in every session. This confirms that our car is able to perform at a circuit with the characteristics of Spa and also achieves our first 1-2 at the track since 1999.

"Oscar and Lando both drove impressive races in very difficult, changing conditions. Once the track had dried up, Oscar went with the Medium tyre while Lando wanted to deviate, going onto Hard tyres which is fair racing. At the time Lando seemed to be in a strong position, but Oscar managed to get the Medium to survive until the end and secured a deserved victory.

"Thank you to everyone who made today's result possible, to the entire team both at track and the factory for their incredible work to deliver upgrades that worked very well on the MCL39. We now turn our attention to Hungary as we look to finish the final double-header before the summer break with another strong result, challenging for victory."

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by kenji, 30/07/2025 14:02

"@ED....Very telling response there. I lived and worked in England during the 'magnificent '60's' and witnessed what I believe to be the forerunner to the disintegration of British society.The influx of multi national immigrants was massive and the population swelled with 'others', who, whilst many were carrying British passports they were not of the land. As a natural extension of these phenomena indigenous British nationalism rose significantly and out of that was born the extensive "bias' exhibited today. My apologies for the oversimplified proposition but I am really talking generalities here as Australians are majorly biased like so many others...but for different reasons which are mainly associated with cricket ...and dare I might add, latterly F1!. The book titled 'The Strange Death of Europe' by Douglas Murray is a brilliant analysis of this very topic and I would recommend it if anyone is interested."

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2. Posted by Editor, 30/07/2025 10:06

"Sadly, once again I agree with Kenji - I must be going down with something.

Although based in the UK we try our very hardest not to show any bias... then again in the current climate this isn't difficult. Long time readers will be aware that I previously admitted to wearing 'rosso tinted glasses', but not any longer.

The bias shown by Sky is not only wrong in terms of a broadcaster but made worse by the fact that it SELLS its coverage worldwide. It is aware that its coverage is shown in, for example, Australia, yet continues to 'big up' the British driver.

Then again, over the least couple of days, despite the various problems throughout the world, and the huge challenges that Britain itself is facing, the headlines have been dominated by the result of a women's football match."

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3. Posted by kenji, 30/07/2025 0:22

"@Mad Matt....The frantic effort by Sky [Croft et al ] to make excuses for Norris's failure to take the win at Spa surely cements the broad universal conclusion of British media bias. Social media would indicate that.What it really does is just highlight certain errors that happen in the normal flow of races by all drivers at one time or another. IMO though by repeated emphasis it is planned to downplay another drivers expertise...especially in this case as the track conditions during the early stages were quite treacherous. Piastri's speed through Eau Rouge/Radillon and up the Kemmel was mighty. Norris was outplayed from the start and the 'claimed battery' deficit was nothing more than a weak excuse. McLaren have stated that it was the same for both cars.
Norris is a very fast and capable driver most of the time and he could well finish up with the WDC as a sixteen point deficit with eleven races to go means very little really. He's already been gifted with a win at Silverstone that had nothing to do with merit. One DNF and Oscar's lead could be wiped out in a flash. There's a long way to go yet and hopefully it goes down to the last few races....just to elevate the tension. Hungary will be important as whoever leads at the break will carry through on a definite positive whilst the other will be pressured into seeking redress. "

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4. Posted by Mad Matt, 28/07/2025 12:55

"Agree on the "mum exposure" thing.... and while on that topic I don't want to see cuts to would be celebrities during the coverage, especially when there's racing to see... quite honestly I'd rather see images of paint drying.

If I were the opposite of @kenji I'd probably complain that McLatern gave Oscar the favoured pit stop, should have double stacked, deliberately took their time in his pit stop, screwed up his battery deployment all to favour their favourite... sorry for my sense of humour :-)

In reality Lando paid the price for a small mistake at La Source but even without that, as we saw from the sprint race, a quality driver behind is likely to get the slip stream and take the place in any case.

Overall a bit of a boring race thanks to not starting soon enough and apart from Leiws the most fun was watching Lando trying to make the hard tyre strategy work... but as @Kenji says even that was ruined in the Sky coverage by Crofty trying to calculate what might have happened if Lando had done X or hadn't done Y and screwing it up!

In short, well done Oscar for a good pass and a steady drive and bad luck Lando but appreciate that you did at least put in the effort to try and make it a race even if it was never really on."

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5. Posted by kenji, 28/07/2025 11:51

"@Editor....Haha ' agree with me' !!! You are just TOO kind Ed."

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6. Posted by Editor, 28/07/2025 9:11

"Re: Finally could someone arrange for Norris's mum to be given limited exposure as I'm sick of seeing her frantically framing love hearts for the cameras!!!

Hard to believe but for once I agree with Kenji... please, make it stop."

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7. Posted by kenji, 28/07/2025 7:02

"Apologies for failing to state that the 'battery level' data request was made during the Sprint race and not the main race on Sunday. Mea culpa."

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8. Posted by kenji, 28/07/2025 6:55

"Cold and wet. Up until 3.00am! At least the result was worth waiting for as Oscar leveraged some worthy redemption for the Silverstone travesty. He drove a calculated race and his stunning start. The sheer speed through a wet Eau Rouge was breathtaking given the conditions were extremely dangerous. WOW. That set the tone. What was extremely annoying was the endless repetition of Norris's errors and miscalculations by Croft et al, during the race broadcast, in an attempt to in some way ameliorate his failure to match and race Piastri. I must admit that I questioned the race tactics employed by McLaren in their tyre choices for both drivers. After the Sprint race I felt as though McLaren were once again surreptitiously working the system again to favor Norris. I don't know whether anyone else noticed but McLaren passed on details of Piastri's battery capacity when asked for by Norris! It's all very well to analyse each others data post race, but to hand a competitor [ that's what a team mate actually is ] important data pertaining to the other side of the garage to allow for a possible concerted attack when that driver is somewhat limited in defense is, IMO, sneaky and unsporting.

Overall the race was somewhat lacklustre but better than no race! Finally could someone arrange for Norris's mum to be given limited exposure as I'm sick of seeing her frantically framing love hearts for the cameras!!! How saccharine can it get? Seeing family support is always good but it needs to be carefully crafted into the narrative. I mean who could possibly forget Perez's father.....at Mexican GP? Finally, the pre race grid walk with Brundle and Rosberg was quite entertaining and Rosberg's attempt to elicit a response from Verstappen senior re his part in facilitating the Horner downfall was welcome. Witnessing Verstappen's attempt to shut it down was telling! Rosberg can be annoying sometimes but he's not afraid to tackle the thorny issues full frontal. Am now looking forward to Hungary and the continued tussle for supremacy at McLaren. "

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