Piastri, coming into his second season within the high flight, bagged fourth place in his house race in Australia final weekend following a team-orders change to fall behind stablemate Lando Norris.
Norris was quicker working on brisker tyres, so the decision was designed to minimise the danger of the pair clashing as Stella reckons the overtake on Piastri was already coming “naturally”.
However the Italian engineer nonetheless heaped praised on the positive aspects Piastri has made with race tempo and tyre administration, saying the FIA F2 champion has “gone a good distance ahead” with McLaren.
Describing Piastri’s execution of the Albert Park race as “very, excellent… in a fragile scenario” with extreme tyre graining, Stella continued: “Even in comparison with final 12 months in Australia, and even Japan, and different locations at the beginning of the season, we have gone a good distance ahead.
“It is extraordinarily encouraging to suppose that that is solely coming at the beginning of the second season.”
Stella added that the longer term appeared brilliant for Piastri, given he nonetheless had a lot to “money in”.
He continued: “Should you suppose how a lot he has to money in additional by way of enchancment, I believe it appears to be like very sturdy for the longer term from Oscar’s viewpoint. [In Australia], it was correctly sophisticated.”
Oscar Piastri, McLaren F1 Group, Andrea Stella, Group Principal, McLaren F1 Group, Lando Norris, McLaren F1 Group, third place, discuss after the race
Picture by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images
Stella credited Piastri’s rising expertise, skill to soak up info and study from situations for serving to him take the steps ahead.
“Once I speak about adapting,” he went on, “this isn’t adapting to when an issue begins. That is adapting to stop the issue to start out.
“You type have to grasp from the context that, ‘Oh, this context would result in this downside’ earlier than the issue really manifests itself.
“When you find yourself a rookie, you might want to form of lead into the issue after which realise how you bought there.
“So, I believe that is the mechanism the place he’s now way more conscious that some circumstances will result in some issues.
“So, when he was driving the tyres round, I believe he was feeling that for those who overdo the entrance tyre just a little bit then the tyres will not be going to be completely satisfied from a graining viewpoint.
“So, you begin to perceive the place is the restrict probably, even going one kph [faster].
“It is a effective tuning, virtually like a self-calibration train by means of expertise.”