Oliver Caffrey, AAP

After an unfortunate start to his Formula One career, Oscar Piasri was relieved to be on the receiving end of some luck in his Australian Grand Prix debut.

The local youngster snatched eighth spot on Sunday in arguably the most chaotic and bizarre conclusion in F1’s 27-year history at Melbourne’s Albert Park.

In a race marred by crashes, fires and stoppages, Piastri survived the carnage to bank the first points – four – of his F1 career.

Piastri was 11th when the GP restarted with two of the 58 laps remaining after a red flag was called following an incident with Haas’ Kevin Magnussen.

But the 21-year-old was promoted inside the top-10 as the restart resulted in more mayhem in the field, with a red flag called for the third time in the 58-lap race.

The race was again stopped for about 30 minutes before it resumed under a safety car as defending champion Max Verstappen claimed his first Australian GP victory in unique and puzzling circumstances.

Piastri finished 20th and 15th in the initial two races of the season in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia as McLaren struggled to put out a competitive car and were plagued by several frustrating issues.

“It’s not been a great first two races for the whole team, for largely things out of our control,” Piastri said.

“The first two races really couldn’t have gone much worse for the team.

“Obviously Bahrain we both had our issues and Saudi with the contact swiping out both of us, so it was nice to be on the good end of other things going wrong for other people.”

The British manufacturer fared much better in Melbourne as Piastri’s teammate Lando Norris crossed the line in sixth.

Piastri joined the F1 circuit as a reserve for Alpine in 2022 before the Melbourne-born driver secured a full-time seat with McLaren ahead of this season.

“Definitely happy to get my first points on the board especially here at home,” Piastri said.

“It was a crazy race, it’s the first race I’ve had three red flags and I think it’s probably most people’s first race like that.聽

“We kept ourselves out of trouble and ended up in the points.”

The F1 circuit will have three weeks off before heading to聽Azerbaijan for the next GP on April 28.