Oscar Piastri admits he’s at a loss to elucidate the hole to teammate Lando Norris in qualifying for the Mexico Metropolis Grand Prix.
Norris took pole place with a shocking closing lap in Q3, beating the 2 Ferrari drivers who supplied the closest menace in qualifying. Piastri was solely eighth quickest in qualifying, and though he can be promoted to seventh by a grid penalty for Carlos Sainz, he says the 0.6s hole to Norris is complicated.
“All the things feels regular, however the hole was large in that session,” Piastri mentioned. “It’s been large all weekend. There’s been some issues the place I really feel like I can tidy it up and make some straightforward progress however not all of it, and I believe in qualifying I did an affordable job and the automotive felt affordable as effectively. The shortage of lap time is a little bit of a thriller.
“Finally I’m only a bit annoyed with how the session’s gone. There’s plenty of issues I may fear about however in the end being that far off whenever you really feel such as you’ve achieved an affordable job is a tough place to be, in order that’s my greatest concern in the intervening time.”
Piastri additionally struggled to match Norris in Austin final weekend – though to not the identical extent – and he does see some similarities between the 2 races.
“In some methods not too dissimilar, however what’s been a bit shocking right here is the hole’s been the identical just about each session,” he mentioned. “I really feel like I’ve achieved some respectable laps by the weekend however every little thing appears to be about four-to-five tenths off, in order that’s clearly not an important signal. However a few of the issues that had been tough in Austin are additionally proving tough right here.
“From Austin, there have been some issues that had been clear, however even these issues that had been clear had been a bit uncommon, a few of the variations, and once more this weekend it’s been a bit completely different. I’ve not modified actually how I’m driving for the reason that begin of the season, even a number of races in the past when issues had been going very well, so it’s tough to pinpoint the place the lap time has been missing this weekend however I’m positive we’ll discover it.”
Beginning seventh – two spots behind Max Verstappen – Piastri says he’ll look to be aggressive at first to try to restrict the harm within the championship battle.
“I’ll strive my finest,” he mentioned. “It’s the longest run of the 12 months, so I’ll try to make up some spots there. If I can unlock the tempo within the automotive then we are able to have some enjoyable – simply must try to unlock it.”
