Oscar Piastri will make his Formula 1 debut in 2023 with McLaren after the FIA’s Contract Recognition Board rules in his favour.
Piastri has been the subject of a contractual saga over recent weeks after he refused a drive with Alpine for next year.
The 21-year-old has been associated with Alpine for a number of years, and undertook a test programme this season in anticipation of a full-time F1 promotion.
However, Piastri denied that he would race with Alpine shortly after it announced him as Fernando Alonso’s replacement for 2023.
It was believed that he had signed an option with McLaren, which has now officially been confirmed by the team, after the CRB reached a unanimous decision that his deal with McLaren was the only valid option.
“I’m extremely excited to be making my F1 debut with such a prestigious team as McLaren and I’m very grateful for the opportunity that’s been offered to me,” Piastri said.
“The team has a long tradition of giving young talent a chance, and I’m looking forward to working hard alongside Lando to push the team towards the front of the grid.
“I’m focused on preparing for my F1 debut in 2023 and starting my F1 career in papaya.”
Piastri will partner Lando Norris next year, who will enter his fifth season with the Woking-based squad.
The Australian driver was forced to sit on the sidelines for the 2022 season after emerging from the 2021 Formula 2 Championship with the Drivers’ title.
The CRB decision stated that Piastri signed with McLaren on July 4 – seven weeks before the team announced it would part ways with Daniel Ricciardo.
“Oscar is one of the up-and-coming talents coming through the feeder series into F1 and we are delighted to see him join the team for 2023,” said McLaren CEO Zak Brown.
“Winning both F3 and F2 in successive rookie seasons is a real achievement and testament to his talent in single-seater racing.
“In Lando and Oscar we have a young, exciting F1 line-up with a huge amount of potential, standing us in good stead to achieve our future ambitions.
“Oscar is an exciting addition to the McLaren family, and we look forward to seeing him grow with our F1 team.”
Oh vey! I’m going to guess white collar criminal (((Zak Brown))) signed him only because he was cheap and it got them out of having to pay Ricciardo several times more for another season. More money to line Brown’s pockets. Perhaps he will get lucky and Piastri will actually be good enough to drive his “papaya” turds to a few podiums.
You must be special or something.
They’ve had to buy Ricciardo out of his contract. That would be more than what he would have been paid to drive the car.
Only someone that knows nothing about motorsport or contracts would make such a moronic statement.
Quite the contrary, I’ve worked in motorsports and have dealt with contracts. You clearly have not. Ricciardo signed a contract with McLaren in 2020 for the years 2021-2022 — that we know of. If it were for beyond 2022, it wouldn’t matter because a typical contract like his would have a performance clause in it where the team has the option to dump the driver at any time (usually after the first season), and Ricciardo has not performed at all during either of his years with McLaren. So even if he had a contract beyond 2022, McLaren likely have to pay him nothing or very little (compared to keeping him at $15 million/year), whereas someone like Piastri is probably going to be paid around a few million per year at the most.
Having a job sweeping the paddock at your local racetrack each Monday morning doesn’t mean you know anything about Ricciardo’s contract. For starters, both Brown and Seidl confirmed that he had one in place for 2023, which they claimed to be intending to honour, so you’ve amply demonstrated straight off the bat that you you know jack shit about the situation. It has also been widely reported that while he was seeking twenty-one million dollars as his payoff terms were settled at the fifteen million he was due to be paid to drive. Again, you know fuck all, even when it’s out in the world to be read by anyone who chooses to do so. Even if you did work in motorsport, you’d be impressing no-one, not least because you are far more stupid, incompetent, and mendacious than you claim Brown to be.
The fact that you are denying most F1 driver contracts do not have performance clauses shows what you know. I do know because I have dealt with them first-hand whether you want to believe it or not. Brown flat-out admitted there are stipulations in Ricciardo’s contract to release him early (see quote below). There are MAYBE four drivers on the grid right now who do not have such am option, and mid-tier driver Ricciardo is not one of them. You are dead wrong about about Brown intending to honour the contract, because he was quoted saying Ricciardo would be staying for 2023 AFTER he had already signed Piastri for next year.
June 11th: “Andreas Seidl says Daniel Ricciardo has a contract to keep racing at McLaren in 2023.
“Earlier, team CEO Zak Brown indicated there may be ****”mechanisms”**** to end the struggling Australian’s deal, as Ricciardo had not lived up to “expectations”.”
July 12th (over a week AFTER signing Piastri): “”But we have a great relationship with Dan and we are constantly texting one another. He will be with us next year and we will do our best to get him back in shape.
“”We know that he is capable of bringing us race wins,” Brown added.”
Firstly, I wrote nothing about what the majority of drivers have in their contract, because it’s irrelevant to the subject at hand, I wrote about the situation regarding Ricciardo, whose contract clearly left him in a strong position when this all arose, because they have agreed to pay him the full amount which was to be due to him for driving for McLaren in 2023.
Secondly, I’m not impressed by your big-mouth, big-shot claims of involvement, whether true or not, though I very much suspect not. I could write on here claiming to be the Queen of fucking Sheba, and it would carry equal credibility to your braggadocio. Plus, the guff you put out here suggests that if you had such involvement, either you’d be going around fucking things up, or somebody with more sense would spot you’re an imbecile and get shut of you pretty damn quick.
Thirdly, if your standard of literacy matched your lofty claims of being someone who deals with the minutiæ of intricate contractual agreements, you would have seen, and just as importantly understood, that when I wrote Brown and Seidl claimed they intended to honour Ricciardo’s contract for 2023, of which, by the way, you began this discourse denying its very existence, that was in no way the same thing as me saying they intended to honour it. A difference which should be palpably obvious to someone who supposedly deals with such details.
Fourthly, as I pointed out down the page in reply to another of your idiotic posts, where you attempted to change the topic under scrutiny, I have not questioned what Brown and/or Seidl have said, at least in terms of content, they have blatantly lied, claiming intentions to which their actions were later revealed to be contrary. The issues I have raised have been exclusively related to the amount of self-aggrandizing bullshit which you have posted on the subject, which is belied by the flagrant and shameless inaccuracies in the statements which you purport to be true.
Finally, if you are such a Billy Bigballs as you feebly attempt to portray yourself, why the fuck do you have the time, let alone the inclination, to come on here boasting about it to a bunch of anonymous racing nerds, while posting overtly meretricious dung that could equally have been invented by an averagely capable seven-year-old?
Curnow, you are an utter fud.
OK, that’s McLaren’s contract.
What contracts had Alpine/Piasti signed to go from junior programme to full seat? Or was it just and ‘understanding, unwritten contract or a hand shake.
Yes this is a FIA rulling but as usual only a partial explanation.
This is the FIA and Zak Brown we are talking about so who knows what the truth is. I wouldn’t be surprised if Zak Brown paid off some people in high places. After all, it was Brown himself only a few weeks before Piastri was signed to McLaren who outright lied by saying the rumors of Ricciardo leaving were completely untrue and he would be back in the car in 2023, when he already had Piastri already signed! This is also the same guy who tanked the value of the McLaren Group in less than a few years, selling off companies within the group and almost all of the McLaren Group’s assets for pennies on the dollar, yet miraculously still manages to keep his CEO position at McLaren for six years now, all the while his net worth rises dramatically. Guess how this $tory will end…
You’re contradicting yourself now. Just a few lines up the page you said that Ricciardo was signed only until the end of this season, now you are admitting that Brown confirmed he had a contract covering 2023 and that he would be honouring it. Even within a single sentance you can’t get your details lined-up. You say Brown was talking a few weeks before Piastri was signed but thathe already had Piastri signed. As far as bullshitters go, Curnow, you’re not even good at it.
July 12th (over a week AFTER signing Piastri): “”But we have a great relationship with Dan and we are constantly texting one another. He will be with us next year and we will do our best to get him back in shape.
“”We know that he is capable of bringing us race wins,” Brown added.”
You know nothing — fuck off.
I wasn’t questioning Brown’s comments, which were quite clearly fallacious, I was questioning yours. Within a single sentence you stated both that Brown was speaking a few weeks before Piastri was signed and that he had already signed Piastri. There’s no getting out of the utter bollocks of that statement, no matter how hard you try to deflect onto some other aspect of the situation. So shut your lame face, cunt, and fuck off yourself.