Oscar Piastri Will Try To 'Understand' Difficult Weekend After Crushing Result At US Grand Prix

While the incident with Lando Norris yesterday that took both McLarens out was enough to create headlines about Oscar Piastri, race day saw the Aussie almost forgotten about.

A resilient Max Verstappen converted his sprint victory and subsequent pole position into a dominant performance in the full race itself, getting through all of the 56 laps comfortably leading the pack.

Meanwhile, Lando Norris had enough pace in his McLaren to fight off Charles Leclerc, managing to fully get ahead of the Ferrari driver on Lap 23 after he had lost the position around the first corner — but for Piastri, his race pace was almost non-existent.

Piastri wants to 'work on' race pace

Speaking to Sky Sports F1 post-race, Oscar Piastri seemed solemn, saying on his fifth-placed finish:

"Today race pace could have saved [me] but I didn't really have that either. It's something I want to work on... there have obviously been the highs at certain points but this weekend... has really been the first weekend where [pace] has been a let down."

Piastri lamented his poor qualifying performance —in sprint qualifying he was four tenths down from Verstappen's pole time in third, and Saturday's qualifying saw him put his car on the third row, in sixth - while teammate Norris came second.

"[There are] some things to try and understand from this weekend because clearly [my issues weren't just] related to qualifying."

On being asked about how he will attempt to come back from a poor performance, Piastri drove home his desire to understand why the car was not performing as it had in previous races.

"[I'll be] Trying to work out why it just didn't gel with the car this weekend... it was just difficult to get into a rhythm at all and that has been the big difference."
Piastri on solving car issues

Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, McLaren — Despite being first and second in the championship, two incidents between McLaren's star duo over the last two race weekends has led to concern. | McLaren Racing

Regarding any potential McLaren team orders in the final five races, taking into consideration that there is now only 14 points between Piastri and Norris, the Aussie was blunt.

"We've both said we wanted an opportunity to try and fight for the championship because we deserve it... I think it's far too close to start picking one over the other."
Piastri on title battle

If Norris wins next time out in Mexico, and Piastri finishes fifth or lower, the title battle will flip in the Briton's favor for the first time since Bahrain. For Verstappen, a double retirement for McLaren at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez would put the Dutchman a singular point behind Norris and 15 points behind Piastri.

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