Oscar Piastri keeps F1 title dream alive despite McLaren blunder at Qatar Grand Prix
Oscar Piastri was left fuming after a McLaren stuff-up ruined his chance of victory at the Qatar Grand Prix, with the result setting up a thrilling final round of the F1 world championship.
Oscar Piastri’s bid to win this year’s Formula One championship remains alive despite a monumental stuff up by his McLaren team that cost the Australian his chance of victory at the Qatar Grand Prix while opening the door for Max Verstappen to pinch the title.
Piastri was fuming after he finished the penultimate race of the season in second place behind the Red Bull of Verstappen, setting up a three way showdown with Lando Norris for the world title in the season finale in Abu Dhabi next weekend. It is the first time since 2010 three drivers can win the championship on the last day of the season.
Piastri can still capture his first world drivers’ championship if he wins in Abu Dhabi and Norris finishes outside the top five but his chances would have been much better if McLaren hadn’t completely botched their pit stop strategy, declining the chance to swap tyres under an early safety car when everyone else did.
It was a terrible decision that cost both McLaren drivers valuable points with Norris missing the podium and finishing fourth, as Carlos Sainz capitalised on the blunder to grab third place for Williams.
“I haven’t spoken to anyone but I feel pretty crap as you can imagine. I don’t know what to say,” a dejected Piastri said.
“We didn’t get it right with the strategy. The pace was very strong. I didn’t put a foot wrong. Just a shame.
“I left it (the decision not to pit early) in the team’s hands to decide what the best strategy was.”
Piastri was understandably shellshocked when he first crossed the line, telling his engineers over the radio that he was ‘speechless’, before venting his frustration in his post-race interviews.
“Clearly we didn’t get it right,” Piastri said.
“I drove the best race that I could and as fast as I could. There was nothing left out there.
“I tried my best but it wasn’t to be.
“In hindsight it’s pretty obvious what we would have done, but I’m sure we’ll discuss it as a team.
“It’s not all bad. It’s been a really good weekend and the pace has been very strong.
“Obviously it’s a little bit tough to swallow at the moment.”
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Norris will now head into the last race leading the championship standings on 408 points. Verstappen has now overtaken Piastri for second spot, but is still 12 behind Norris. Piastri is a further four adrift.
Had they both pitted early and Piastri gone on to win with Norris third, the gap would have been 12 rather than 16.
Norris will win the title regardless of where his rivals finish if he places in the top three in Abu Dhabi but Verstappen is now looming as his big danger. Already a four-time world champion, the Dutchman needs to win in Abu Dhabi and hope Norris finishes fourth or worse to claim a fifth title.
“I didn’t expect to win today, that’s for sure,” Verstappen said.
“Looking at pure pace, we were not on the same level as McLaren, but we made the right call, as most of the grid did, in boxing under the safety car.
“That almost gives you a free pit stop and that made the race for me.
“I knew after that pit stop it was going to be two long stints on the tyre in terms of tyre wear, but we managed that very well and they didn’t really catch up too much. It was all under control.
“For sure, that call at the pit stop made me win the race.
“I don’t think it was about (McLaren) playing too fair. It was about missing the whole pit stop opportunity. ”On pure pace they are faster, but as it showed again anything is possible.”
Norris also acknowledged McLaren had made a big mistake in not pitting early.
“It’s tough. We just have to have faith in the team in making the right decision,” he said.
“It’s always a gamble. I feel like we’re the ones who took the gamble in a way. Now it’s the wrong decision and we shouldn’t have done it.
“Oscar lost the win and I lost P2. We didn’t do a good job today, but we’ve done plenty of good jobs in other races and we won the constructors’ seven or six races ago because of that. ”Not our finest day, but that’s life.“
Asked whether McLaren’s team rules of giving both drivers equal opportunities to win races was unwittingly hurting their chances, the Englishman fired back: “It’s nothing to do with that. Everyone keeps thinking that, but it’s got nothing to do with that. We’re free to race.
“Red Bull were just as quick…they did a better job as a team and made the right call. That’s it.
“We’ll review things, see what we could have done better. We already know we didn’t make the right decision. You can’t get them all right.
“They do their job. I do my job. If we do that we’ll be fine.“
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella admitted Piastri deserved better after dominating in Qatar, winning the sprint race and qualifying on pole position for the full-length Grand Prix.
“It’s a disappointing result overall,” Stella said.
“We had the potential to win the race with Oscar, he deserved that. He was fastest in qualifying and the sprint.
“Certainly the podium was available for Lando but we lost the victory with Oscar and we lost the podium with Lando.
“Definitely not the outcome we wanted. Something we will review with the decision we made when there was the safety car on lap seven.
“As usual we will learn from racing and will get stronger for the next event, which will become more important.”
The Qatar Grand Prix is a unique race because teams are not allowed to run the same set of tyres for more than 25 laps because of the wear and tear that the high-speed Lusail International circuit has on rubber.
With the race held over 57 laps, that means drivers have to stop at least twice, so strategy plays a bigger role than in most other races.
Being able to stop during a safety car is regarded as a bonus because it allows teams to reduce the time they lose because any cars that remain on track have to slow down.
McLaren was the only team not to dive straight back into the pits, even though Piastri was comfortably in front and Norris was third, just behind Verstappen.
“In fairness, we didn’t expect everyone else to pit,” Stella said.
“Once everyone pitted, it makes that the right thing to do. When you have the lead car, you don’t know what the others are going to do.
“There could have been a loss for Lando if we pitted both cars with the double stack, but, effectively, the main reason was not expecting everyone else to pit.
“It was a decision. As a matter of fact it wasn’t the correct decision.”
Originally published as Oscar Piastri keeps F1 title dream alive despite McLaren blunder at Qatar Grand Prix
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