Damon Hill suggests F1 driver joined the incorrect team in blunder

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Damon Hill has suggested F1 rookie Oscar Piastri may be regretting his decision to join McLaren. In one of the biggest talking points in the sport last season, Alpine announced that Oscar Piastri would replace Fernando Alonso in 2023, who went to join Aston Martin.

However, the youngster surprisingly announced soon after that he had no plans to join Alpine and was instead keen on a move to McLaren, where Daniel Ricciardo was set to depart.

The Woking-based outfit acquired the services of Piastri to leave Alpine furious, with Ricciardo’s contract terminated to make space for the rookie. It has been a disappointing start to 2023 for the youngster and teammate Lando Norris, with both drivers pointless after the first two races of the year, with the former even failing to finish his debut race in Bahrain.

The MCL60 car is much less competitive than the team would have liked and 1996 world champion Hill thinks the Australian may be regretting making the switch. “He probably thought McLaren was the best option, the better environment for him,” said the Brit, as per the Dutch edition of Motorsport.com.

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“Alpine is good at the moment – they don’t set the world on fire, but they look more competitive than McLaren. So yes, maybe he does regret that. But on the other hand, he is now competing against the highly-rated Lando.

“It’s a strange thing in our sport, that as a driver you are judged on your performance against your teammate. You can be in a less competitive car, but all you need is to be faster than a man who some say is a future world champion.”

Despite his poor performances on the track, McLaren bosses have heaped praise upon the way Piastri has adapted to life as a F1 driver. Ahead of his first race in front of his home crowd in Melbourne this weekend, McLaren F1 team principal Andrea Stella dismissed any suggestions they will have to give him any extra protection.

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“We have seen really strong progress by Oscar,” Stella told Autosport. “Obviously, Lando is a complete certainty. So we know that Lando is there.

“So there’s some positives, but for me the message stays the same. We need to work hard to improve the car and go back racing where we should belong.” He added: “He is a very calm guy, I think he will be able to keep himself in the bubble.

“But certainly we’ll have to make sure that he can stay focused on racing, and he can stay focused on keeping up with this exceptional rate of development session after session.”

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