Nico Rosberg slams Zak Brown for lack of Oscar Piastri ‘empathy’

Nico Rosberg has criticised McLaren boss Zak Brown for showing a lack of “empathy” to Oscar Piastri after he lost out on the F1 drivers’ world championship.

Piastri finished second in Sunday’s season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen as he missed out on winning his maiden world championship.

The 2025 drivers’ crown was instead won by Piastri's McLaren teammate Lando Norris, who completed the podium in third to beat Verstappen to his first world title by two points.

Having just congratulated Norris on his achievement over team radio, McLaren Racing CEO Brown then spoke to Piastri.

The Australian was being consoled by his race engineer when Brown interrupted the conversation to say: “What a season, what a season. You're a star. Seven wins. We love ya. We'll do it again next year. Thank you Oscar for everything you've done. What a year.”

Brown followed that up by adding: "Oscar, very proud of you. Awesome. What a team player. We go again next year. See you on the podium.”

Those comments didn’t sit well with 2016 world champion Rosberg, who felt Brown should have shown “a little more empathy”.

"That's his most horrible moment in his racing career,” Rosberg told Sky Sports F1.

"Maybe Zak could have had a little more empathy there, rather than celebrating.

"He could have said 'next year will be your year', but it's difficult for Zak because he's so ecstatic at the same time.”

Brown later labelled Piastri as an F1 world champion of the future.

"He is a future world champion. Both of our guys won seven races, drove brilliantly, supported each other," Brown told Sky Sports F1.

"It's a cruel sport, things sometimes go your way, sometimes don't. I'm excited to go racing with these two drivers next year.

"We let them race until the end. Most people thought that would be impossible to pull off. It's a dream racing with these two guys.”