After qualifying 6th for the F1 Las Vegas GP, Liam Lawson’s night was ruined by early contact with Oscar Piastri, dropping all the way to 14th by the chequered flag. It continues a rough stretch of F1 races for the Racing Bulls driver, who has only scored in two of his last eight races.
At lap one, turn one, Lawson, trying to avoid the hard-braking George Russell, slid into the side of Piastri. Both cars continued for the next lap but Lawson’s front wing broke at the turn 7-8 chicane. He limped around the rest of the lap to change his front wing, but was never able to recover his pace.
Contrite Lawson “just went in deep”
After the race, Lawson, who was not penalised by the F1 stewards, accepted full responsibility.
“Honestly, I haven’t even seen the incident, I just know I made contact. So yeah, obviously apologies to Oscar, and to our guys because I wasn’t trying to overtake or anything like that. Obviously in hindsight I would have just braked a bit earlier and just tried to get through turn one safely.
“I just went in deep. I actually wasn’t even trying to overtake or anything like that. Russell checked up, it was very slippery and the guys in front, I was heading towards the back of whoever was in front of me and basically I had to try and avoid it. So big apologies to the team. Obviously Oscar as well, we didn’t mean to run into him.“
One of three cars to make a second stop
Lawson noted that tyre management was “maybe a little bit easier than we expected, but definitely not easy. I think it’s fine margins still, but I think we had less issues this year than last year, that’s for sure.” Despite this, Lawson was mired in the back for the rest of the Las Vegas GP, and even before taking a second pitstop on lap 28 only made his way up to 15th.
All in all, it was a Saturday night that Lawson would hope would stay in Vegas. “It’s just a shame to have two cars start in the points and not finish in the points.”
