The Formula Two championship has a new leader and it's talented Australian motorsport driver Oscar Piastri.
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The 20-year-old, who has strong family ties to Shepparton, moved into the lead of the F1 feeder championship following a comprehensive race weekend at Britain's Silverstone circuit.
Piastri claimed his first pole in F2, two fastest laps and a podium in the fourth round of the championship.
The young gun now leads the drivers’ championship on 108 points, while fellow Alpine Academy driver Guanyu Zhou is close behind on 103.
The weekend got off to a memorable start for the reigning F3 winner.
Piastri clinched his maiden pole during qualifying on Friday, followed by two top-10 finishes in Saturday's sprint races.
Starting first on the grid for Sunday's feature race, Piastri was well-placed to clinch his second win of the year.
A poor start and lack of race pace didn't help the speed demon, but some sublime defensive driving allowed him to hang onto third.
In a video posted to his social media channels, the rookie F2 driver gave his thoughts on the race weekend.
“In general, it was a very good weekend, got pole, solid Saturday with two fastest laps, but struggled a little bit today (in feature race), so not all bad,” Piastri said.
“Coming out with the championship lead, a very solid weekend, just a little bit disappointing to not convert the feature, but we live and learn.
“If we have bad days coming third and stuff like that then I'll take that.”
Meanwhile, Piastri's mentor Mark Webber recently heralded the rising star as one of the best junior drivers on the planet.
Webber, a nine-time race winner in F1, told nine.com.au before the weekend that Piastri has what it takes to make the jump to F1.
“We don't know how many guys are going to move up from F2 next year, but Oscar is one of two or three that have the talent to do it, rather than relying on money,” Webber said.
“He's got his F1 super licence already, from winning the F3 championship.
“He's one of the best three juniors in the world in my opinion.”
Piastri is next in action on the weekend of September 10-12 when the championships heads to the temple of speed, Monza.
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