Oscar Piastri News: F1 star issues Zak Brown apology for getting it badly wrong about Aussie star

Brown, Piastri, socials — Photo: © IMAGO

Oscar Piastri

F1 star issues Zak Brown apology after getting it badly wrong about Oscar Piastri

Romain is very very sorry, Zak

Graham Shaw Consultant Editor

Digital sports specialist running global brands for 30 years

Tuesday 15 September 2026 21:45

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Former F1 star Romain Grosjean has apologised to Zak Brown after mistakenly misquoting the McLaren CEO's comments about his Australian driver Oscar Piastri.

The struggles of Piastri have been one of the storylines of the 2026 season - the 25-year-old from Melbourne star has been in a slump since looking well on the road to winning the world title at the 2025 summer break.

Piastri currently sits in seventh place in the Drivers' standings - 66 points behind defending world champion and papaya team-mate Lando Norris. He again had a disappointing day at the Spanish Grand Prix on Sunday as he finished P8.

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The race came 24 hours after qualifying where Piastri could only make it to P7 while Norris produced a blistering lap to claim pole.

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Grosjean goes off on Zak Brown over Piastri 'comments'

That led to the surprising flashpoint when Grosjean caused a major stir with his comments. In short, he mistakenly misquoted Brown as saying Piastri was a slower driver compared to Norris.

Grosjean initially said: "I saw a statement from Zak Brown about Lando Norris' lap, he cut Oscar Piastri to pieces with a pair of scissors and a chainsaw right there."

"The harshness, the violence of that statement... The question was that Norris had done a good qualifying and he was asked how to explain the difference. Basically, he said that Lando was world champion and that he was better than Oscar."

Grosjean mistakenly misquoted Zak Brown.

What Zak Brown really said, and Grosjean says sorry

In summary, what Brown had actually said was: "Oscar's been right there with him all weekend and just didn't get that same extra lap. We'll continue to look at it. He'll look at the data and probably do what we all did and go, 'wow, what a lap' as well."

So Grosjean got things badly wrong, and was quick to atone for the error as his comments created a storm on social media.

He apologised for his error, writing on X: Today, I made a comment on Canal+ regarding Zak Brown’s comments about Oscar Piastri during an interview yesterday on F1TV, which I was part of.

"I completely misunderstood his words and want to apologise for that. I know how important it is to Zak and the entire McLaren team to respect their drivers and treat them fairly and equally."