Last weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix felt like a turning point within McLaren. Oscar Piastri was outstanding, taking a comfortable pole, followed by a win that never looked in doubt. Lando Norris, on the other hand, qualified in sixth and had a scruffy race to third place. Lando still leads the championship by three points. But after seeing Lando get penalised after starting outside his grid box and finishing behind George Russell, whose car was broken, it feels like Oscar is becoming the favourite to win the championship. This is a stark contrast from last year, where Lando, despite having quite a few scruffy weekends, was easily the faster McLaren driver. Whilst Oscar showed flashes of pace and potential, I did not expect him to take the step-up required to become fight for the championship. But, after witnessing the last four weekends, I’ve been proven wrong in my assumptions. Furthermore, the signs of Oscar’s ascension have been evident since Round One of this season.

Oscar was unfortunate to lose out at Round One in Australia. Whilst Lando outqualified him and Max Verstappen overtook him at the start, once Oscar got past Max his pace was stunning. He quickly caught up to Lando and whilst team orders prevented him from making a move at that point, Oscar appeared to have a good chance of winning. However, when the race’s second spell of rain came, everything fell apart for Oscar. Both McLaren drivers went off the track after being the first to hit a wet patch, but Oscar came off worse, as he slid onto the grass and struggled when recovering his car. Whilst he put on a comeback drive to ninth after the safety car, Oscar was twenty-three points behind Lando in the championship afterwards. For Oscar to turn things around, he had to impress quickly.

At Round Two in China, Oscar was the stronger McLaren driver. After a decent sprint in which he finished second to Lando’s eighth, Oscar pipped Russell and Norris to take his first pole position. He then comfortably led the whole race, whilst Lando held on to finish in second, despite some awful brake problems towards the end. Oscar’s weekend in Shanghai showed that he could be the stronger McLaren driver throughout an event. After this win, he was only ten points behind Lando in the championship and had moved up from ninth to fourth.

Round Three in Japan left me wondering what could have been if Oscar had hooked everything together. The race proved to be a processional affair, with qualifying largely determining where people finished. Lando was OK in qualifying, putting together a decent lap. But Oscar had the potential to be stunning. He was so quick in sectors two and three. Unfortunately, he made a costly mistake at turn two, so despite his superior pace, could only qualify third, behind Lando and pole sitter Verstappen. The three drivers finished the race in that order, despite calls to the team from the faster Piastri to let him past Lando. Thus, Oscar lost three points to his teammate and now sat thirteen points behind, though had jumped past George Russell to third in the championship.

Then came Round Four. Where everything came together for Oscar. He had such a convincing performance in Bahrain. Whilst Lando was lucky to finish in third. Furthermore, as this short rundown of the races has demonstrated, there’s a case to be made that Oscar has been faster in every weekend this season. Now sitting second in the championship, only three points behind Lando, there’s a good chance he takes the championship lead this Sunday. Whilst it is not over for Lando, who is a very quick driver with great potential, Oscar is the more consistent and faster driver at present. Lando really needs to turn things around, or Oscar could start running away with this championship. But, if the two drivers fight, they need to keep it clean. Because Max Verstappen is still shadowing them and will take every opportunity he can to be in the championship hunt. Oscar and Lando may be the favourites for the championship now, but they both could still easily lose.

P.S. The Bahrain Grand Prix was the first truly great race this season. Whilst the wet conditions made for fun in Australia, the best F1 races are those where there are multiple different tyre strategies. I hope that Pirelli learnt the lesson from the Japanese Grand Prix and continue to bring the appropriate tyres to each race weekend, which thankfully appears to be the case for this weekend’s race in Saudi Arabia.