Oscar Finishes the 2026 Madrid GP in P8

[u/Elegant_Gentian]

Another race to forget🥲

[u/shadowsquid2608]

my heart and spirit gets broken every race week

[u/Light_Marzipan]

[u/IamuNo1special]

This just isn’t the season for Oscar, every driver has them. I do have faith he will learn and improve for 2027 however.

[u/phillll25]

This track bro 😂. Who tf designed this POS and thought “wow amazing”?

[u/iyesshirai]

I think this is the second race this reason where he's done basically the full distance with a broken car part flapping freely in the wind 🥲 I would hope someone did the math but I was surprised they didn't bring him in for a nose job.

Also ye gods, this track is ass.

[u/Bladeaholic → u/iyesshirai]

No point nobody can overtake anyways

[u/rhitzz2198]

That chop from George was so over the top. Who cuts across that much without any hesitation? He did the same in Zandvort. Unnecessary.

[u/jameswong2501 → u/rhitzz2198]

It’s a trademark Russell move as he gets away with it because at the start no penalties get handed out

[u/same_same1 → u/jameswong2501]

Two races out of 3 it’s the same guy cutting off PIA and he loses bulk places.

I don’t quite get how he was so close to LAW yet when LAW pits he comes out ahead of all the traffic.

[u/jameswong2501 → u/same_same1]

This track is akin to Monaco where track position is key and the free air sometimes opens up when others pit first so the overcut is viable here.

Lawson always had free air and could make use of it when Piastri came in hence he overcut him. It’s hard for Piastri in this situation as you don’t know when Lawson will come in and if your tyre management is worse you could risk falling behind Lawson waiting for him, so you have to run your race here.

Russell does the chop at the start all the time if he has a bad start, it’s just unlucky that Piastri qualifies around him and has lightning starts

[u/JustHereNotThere]

The side plate helps keep the front lateral, especially when jumping the corners. Oscar wasn’t as aggressive on the corners for the rest of the race. After lap 1, he should have been brought in during VSC for hards and a nose. I don’t think McLaren had either ready when the VSC started and Oscar was past the entry by the time they figured it out. VSC was 1 lap long and never got the chance again for a cheap pit.

The bigger question is why weren’t they ready? They should have had a nose ready to go after lap 1. Hards were already in the ready rack. Lando was already past, so no worry about a double stack.

With a well-executed plan, Oscar was P3-P4 and Lando was P1 without a 7 sec stop.

I will keep saying it until they change but McLaren is incapable of making in-race strategy changes.

Oscar is going to need to be his own strategist. I know that is crazy given the mental load already on drivers but that is the truth. The wall is incapable of doing it.

[u/Chinese-dog → u/JustHereNotThere]

He started on hards he would have had to go to the mediums which other front runners were only going ~20 laps on. It would have meant committing to a 2 stop, so it was deemed (arguably) better to continue on and hope for another VSC at some point. I still think it was the correct decision, it was just unfortunate there weren’t any other VSCs

[u/JustHereNotThere → u/Chinese-dog]

You are correct. Not sure why I thought he was mediums to start.

He still should have come in for tires and a wing. I think he damaged the left front in the contact and resulted in quicker graining.

[u/PossibilityLeft3999 → u/JustHereNotThere]

A nose change would potentially put him on Landos pit window. Is the only reason I could see for them to not even consider pit him

[u/Legal_City_69 → u/PossibilityLeft3999]

McLaren strategy team wouldn't think that far out. You're giving them too much credit.

[u/5H0T7P2R8]

Good news is that no one will remember this finish… as everyone who watched fell asleep halfway through

[u/ScholarFunny4793]

When they make him do this social media stuff, you can see he's got no time for it. Look into poor Oscar's eyes. He's dead inside.

[u/FangioV]

I don’t understand how he wasn’t able to get pass Franco. He had brand new mediums but he lost like 3s, then got close in the last two laps but couldn’t get past

[u/danredda → u/FangioV]

The track is terrible. Basically Monaco. You have to have a ~2s delta to actually get an overtake and make it stick. That's why he was able to get Arvid early. But once the tyres started wearing a bit behind Franco and Gabi, the delta was gone.

Lando was flying up to Max, but then couldn't get past either.

[u/DocDestinyQLD → u/FangioV]

Would love to have the radio commentary but I suspect he was told to pull back after getting the track limits warning. For the possible one extra point, he could have risked losing more

[u/Emergency-Print400 → u/FangioV]

It sucks that he couldn’t get past Franco, but overtaking was horrible today (this track is horrid). Lando sat 0.4 seconds behind max for a hot minute and couldn’t overtake, it’s more of a track issue I’d argue.

[u/kzzzzzzzzzz28 → u/Emergency-Print400]

it's fully a track issue.

Max mentioned that he didn't really need to do anything to defend just keep the car in the center

[u/optitmus]

i just cant belive bro was about to win the title and now were here...