last doompost but the way that oscar's career is constantly maligned by the fact that he is almost always ALONE kills me. he left home at a young age and his father returned to australia after half a year, which is an understandable sacrifice for his dream, but still he was by himself. in karting it's been mentioned that he was bullied off the road because he thought everyone was his mate and he was always punching in a category above his own. prema was the era where it really seemed like he had a team that was actually ride or die for him, but even then he was in the alpine junior program. THEN the whole alpine saga where he's treated as the most evil person in the world by the people who made the mistake. he was SUED and BULLIED online globally to the point of death threats. And he had to suck it up because his pr was bad enough at that point, and talking about it would just make him seem even more unfavorable. now with mclaren: his rookie year it seemed like he'd found a team that would be there for him, but then 2024 rolls around. the hungary situation in itself was the death knell for that. the team orders, mclaren making their drivers be the ones to wipe up their messes--especially oscar. and now this season where he TRIES so FREAKING HARD and then they ask him not to chase lando in australia, whatever the hell the monza bs was with the tows in quali and then the swap. not bringing him to celebrate in singapore, not upholding their own rules IN singapore, the upgrade packages he won't even use because they aren't even remotely for BOTH the drivers. And now in qatar where they fuck over his chances at the championship, aren't even there for his podium except the 5 people who are in his garage who give a fuck, tom stallard his race engineer NOT being one of them, and then have the audacity to do whatever zak brown was pr ing in the media pen. and even through everything, oscar still refuses to bad mouth the team, i don't want to hear another word about his loyalty. and even when it's all going to shit he TRIES and TRIES until there's nothing left in the tank, because he wants to race even if he's got to be a one man show. but my god does that have to take a toll. regardless of what happens in abu dhabi, I'm really fucking proud of him, and he's a damn good driver. until the end and it's mathematically impossible, OP81 wdc 2025
