It was at an Oakleigh go-kart monitor that James Sera predicted a then 9-year-old Oscar Piastri was destined for System 1.
“The very first time I noticed him [race] I went residence and advised my spouse ‘I feel this child goes to be in F1,’” says Sera, a former go-kart champion.
Oscar Piastri’s outdated go-kart coach James Sera says the rising star was all the time destined for System 1.Credit score:Paul Jeffers
Sera had thought it was “solely a matter of time” earlier than Piastri was on the grid in F1. That prediction is about to return true. Piastri will drive with McLaren subsequent season after F1’s contract recognition board resolved a dispute over his future.
Alpine, for whom Piastri had been a reserve and take a look at driver, had been assured of retaining him however the four-person tribunal dominated McLaren had an current contract in place.
After his preliminary encounter with Piastri in 2010, Sera grew to become the younger driver’s first coach and travelled everywhere in the nation racing with him for the following 5 years.
“We went in all places in Victoria and interstate to Queensland, NSW, South Australia,” his former coach says. “Each second week we had been racing.”
Oscar Piastri in his go-karting days in 2014.
Sera, who stays near Piastri and his father Chris, remembers considered one of his favorite races with Piastri in Newcastle, when he got here second on the Australian nationwide dash kart championship junior clubman occasion in 2014.
“He was so younger, he was racing youngsters a lot older than him, he began additional down the pack and acquired to the entrance. It was a great race.”
