\u201cincredibly difficult to drive\u201d<\/a> after qualifying, Piastri said nothing changed on race day.<\/p>\n\u201cThe car felt more or less the same as it did all weekend,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Australian called the weekend \u201ctricky\u201d and when asked to elaborate on that, he replied: \u201cThe car is just very, very difficult to extract the performance from. I think if you can do it, it\u2019s reasonably quick, but trying to do it is, as I said yesterday, very, very tough.\u201d<\/p>\n
The one positive Piastri called out was taking some points from title leaders Mercedes – particularly after an incident with Russell on the opening lap that resulted in the Englishman copping a five-second penalty.<\/p>\n
The two cars made contact and smoke came off the tyres.<\/p>\n
\u201cPiastri\u2019s on the outside of the track, he notices Russell is locked up and switches back to appear on the inside,\u201d Sky Sports\u2019 Anthony Davidson explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, before the corner, he\u2019s not really threatening Russell at all. He\u2019s clearly behind. It\u2019s not like they\u2019re neck-and-neck fighting into this corner.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe switches back because he notices the Mercedes running wide, and then draws alongside. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd yes, he still would have been in a similar position if Russell had slowed it down enough to be on the white line.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut going off track and gaining a lasting advantage, I was struggling to figure out in my head why you\u2019d get a five-second penalty for that.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I do understand it more for what happens (at the next corner).<\/p>\n
\u201cThat contact pushes the car off circuit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite faring better than Piastri, Norris shared similar concerns about his car.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe thing is I\u2019m having to push way beyond what I would do in an ideal scenario,\u201d Norris said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI gave myself the best opportunity for a good result, like a great result, today, which was hoping for a VSC or a safety car, or whatever it was.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe gave ourself the best shot. By the end of the race, it didn\u2019t look like it because I paid the price of trying to get the best result. Especially in that middle part of the race, but P5 was the best I could achieve today, so I\u2019m happy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe still aren\u2019t quick enough,\u201d Norris added. \u201cAnd not quick enough to do anything surprising, or really be able to come through. I feel like the pace was, after the first ten laps was where I was at the end of the race, so yeah, we need a little bit more.\u201d<\/p>\n
After watching both McLaren drivers\u2019 interviews, Sky Sports\u2019 Anthony Davidson spelled out exactly why the team in papaya team struggled at a track where Piastri has always found the going tough.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t seem that long ago though since Madring where realistically, Norris should have blitzed it,\u201d Davidson said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe should have absolutely dominated the race without the unlucky VSC for him. So, I think the car just suits high grip surfaces, which this isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt suits smooth tracks as well, which this isn\u2019t, and it doesn\u2019t suit, as you heard from Lando, slow speed corners.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, maybe they\u2019ll wait \u2018til Qatar until the car can be back into the zone where it feels like it\u2019s in its happy place.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oscar Piastri has once again expressed his disappointment with the capabilities of his McLaren as the Australian was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":941204,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-941203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=941203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941203\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/941204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=941203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=941203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=941203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}