Oscar Piastri didn’t have the F1 Qualifying session he anticipated ahead of the Spanish GP, as he found himself thinking about the possibility for more. The Aussie never appeared to be fully comfortable at the Madring, steering clear of drama but also not tapping into the full potential of the MCL40.
An difficult F1 Qualifying for Piastri ahead of the Spanish GP
The McLaren talent, sitting in P7 of the championship standings, advanced easily through Q1. Q2 was a little bit more on edge, as Piastri scraped by through in P9, with the same time set by Lindblad and 0.019s off the cutoff zone, whereas he set his fastest lap in Q3 to secure P7, in 1:32.204. He was 0.022s ahead of Liam Lawson.
All in all, he was not satisfied with his afternoon, especially as his Qualifying performances had been stronger in the past few rounds. Piastri opened up about the tough Q3 he experienced in F1 Qualifying ahead of the Spanish GP, going into detail about the aspects which influenced his suboptimal driving.
“I think that was really just one of those sessions where you wish you could hit the reset button and have another go. Rather than struggling with anything massively, it was just quite messy. The first lap of Q1 I had to abort and you just get yourself a bit out of sequence and out of the rhythm a bit.
“On a track like this it’s very easy to lose a lot of time. So that was that. Also, my last lap in Q3, I’m not surprised it’s that far off because it was pretty crap. So yeah, that’s how it goes sometimes unfortunately.
“Obviously there has been a bit of a better weekend like in Monza, that I at least am happier with what the car is doing. Today was simply just one of those sessions where you shouldn’t be happy.”
No room for improvements
Asked whether he believes there could have been potential for pole as teammate Lando Norris delivered, the Aussie was brutally honest as he denied it.
“Probably not. If you did a good job it felt like it could get higher than where we’d kind of been sitting. But to be on pole is clearly an impressive job.”
The actual race will be a much different threat, especially considering how much tyre degradation has already played into place in Qualifying, with several drivers having their best flier on the first attempts.
Piastri also recounted his graining issues from the previous day, with his tyres ruining already following the shorter practice stints.
“Difficult to know what it’s going to be like tomorrow. I think we’ve not really learnt anything new today on the tyres so we’ll wait and see. But yeah, the graining was pretty severe yesterday. So hopefully it’s cleared up a little bit. It’ll make it more interesting so let’s wait and see what we get.”
