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The Melbourne driver became the first Australian to lead the points in 15 years and may be the first to win the world driver’s crown in 45 years.
Oscar Piastri has shot to the top of the Formula One world championship points score after winning his third grand prix of the season in Saudi Arabia.
The McLaren driver – who hails from Melbourne – won the race after starting second on the grid, beating four-time world champion Max Verstappen to the first corner in a battle which saw the Dutchman go off-track and earn a five-second penalty.
Verstappen could not catch Piastri, who took his third win of the season after five races to lead the driver’s points standings – the first Australian to do so since Mark Webber, now his manager, in 2010.
The 24-year-old championship leader said the achievement doesn’t change a thing for him at this early stage of the 2025 season, despite winning twice in the past three weeks.
“I'm not that bothered by the fact that I'm leading the championship, but I'm proud of the work and the reasons behind why we're leading the championship,” he said in the post-race press conference.
“Leading the championship is a result of all the hard work we've done in the off-season, the hard work I've done personally, the hard work the team's done.
“I'm more proud of all of those things than I am of the fact that I'm leading the championship because, ultimately, I want to be leading it after round 24, not round five.”
While Webber came close to claiming the title for Red Bull in 2010 – finishing 14 points behind championship winning team-mate Sebastian Vettel in the end – Piastri is now the favourite to take this year’s crown, albeit only five events into the 24-round season.
With 99 points, the Melburnian sits 10 points clear of McLaren team-mate Lando Norris – who crashed in qualifying at Saudi Arabia before a recovery drive from tenth to fourth – with Verstappen two points further back on 87.
Piastri is the only driver to have won more than a single race so far in 2025 – with his three Grands Prix wins to Norris and Verstappen’s one each – with Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton winning the only Saturday Sprint race so far, in which the Australian was second.
Piastri is also the only driver to achieve a win in 2025 from second or lower on the grid – having won from pole in China and Bahrain but winning the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix from second.
The battle to the first corner between Piastri and pole-sitter Verstappen was the talking point after the race, with the Dutchman’s five-second penalty issued by race officials for having “left the track and gained a lasting advantage that was not given back”.
It was deemed the Red Bull driver’s move off the track to stay in the lead was illegal, with the penalty served during his first pit stop to hand Piastri the lead he’d won heading into the first turn.
“Once I got on the inside, I wasn’t coming out of turn one in second,” said Piastri after the race.
“I tried my best; obviously the stewards had to get involved but I thought I was plenty far enough up and in the end that’s what got me the race. So yeah, very happy with all the work we’ve been doing with the starts and that’s what won us the race today.”
Red Bull disagreed with the decision, despite a similar move late in the grand prix by Racing Bulls driver Liam Lawson – who was Verstappen’s team-mate at Red Bull for the opening two races of 2025 before being demoted – when battling the Alpine driven by Australian Jack Doohan.
Lawson was given a harsher 10-second penalty for not staying on track when carrying out his passing attempt on lap 28 of the 50-lap race, further underlining the relative leniency for Verstappen’s infringement.
“Given that this was lap one and [a] turn one incident, we considered that to be a mitigating circumstance and imposed a five-second time penalty instead,” the officials’ document for Verstappen’s penalty said.
“We were a bit unfortunate with the penalty, but besides that the car was strong,” Verstappen said in the post-race press conference.
“Despite everything in the race, getting P2 quite close behind Oscar was overall a positive weekend for us.”
The next round of the 2025 Formula One world championship is the Miami Grand Prix in the United States on 5 May.
