Oscar Piastri is having an absolute shocker in 2026. The Australian arrived at the summer break already struggling to adapt to McLaren's new regulations car, and things got worse when he retired from Hungary. What makes it tougher is that his teammate Lando Norris is thriving in these conditions, which has created a pretty brutal headtohead between the two drivers. Norris is dominating the qualifying battle 7-4 and absolutely owns the sprint results, though Piastri's hanging on in race day situations with a 6-5 advantage there.

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The real problem is that Piastri's natural driving style just doesn't mesh with how the 2026 regulations demand you hustle these cars. He struggles when the rear gets slidey, which becomes even more painful at low-grip circuits. Meanwhile, Norris seems to have unlocked the code, and that just widened the gap even further. Things came to a head in Hungary when Lando overcutting Piastri on strategy, leaving Oscar with a retired car and nowhere to hide.

Now here's where it gets potentially worse for Piastri. McLaren have been working on their own rotating rear wing, basically their version of Red Bull's Macarena design, and they're planning to race it at Monza in September. The team delayed rolling this out because of complexity issues with how the upper flap transitions between modes. They only got their reserve driver Leonardo Fornaroli to test it in Hungary's first practice, but that was enough intel for McLaren to commit to using it in Italy.

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The issue is that this upgrade could make Piastri's life significantly more difficult. He's already struggling with the MCL40's characteristics, and adding a rotating rear wing with integration challenges is basically handing him another problem to solve. Just look at what happened to Max Verstappen with Red Bull's version in Austria and Silverstone, spinning out because the rear wing's behaviour caught him out. If McLaren's version forces Piastri to brake earlier to avoid similar spins, he'll lose even more time to Norris, who's apparently figured out how to manage these things.

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The timing is rubbish too. Norris just got an upgrade boost and won Hungary, with more updates coming at Zandvoort. Piastri faces low-grip tracks ahead where he already struggles, and now potentially a rear wing that requires completely different management just when he needs to close the gap, not fall further behind.

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