Oscar Piastri says he’s “definitely ready” to win a Grand Prix in 2024 after several frustrating near-misses. At Silverstone, the Australian was running second behind McLaren teammate Lando Norris when the latter pitted for intermediates as rain intensified.
Rather than double-stacking as Mercedes did, McLaren sent Piastri around for another lap, and he lost a huge amount of time on the slippery track. He eventually finished fifth, 12 seconds behind winner Lewis Hamilton.
The Silverstone disappointment came on the back of a run of frustrating weekends for both Piastri and Norris.
“I think definitely ready to do it,” he said when asked if he was ready to finally win. “I think the kind of good thing, but kind of bad thing, is that it’s never been the same thing that’s prevented us from winning.
“Obviously, today we made a wrong call. Imola, we had an issue in qualifying with traffic. The less said about qualifying in Austria the better!
“I guess it’s a good thing that it’s not been a repeated error or mistake. But I feel like there’s been a good handful now, I think, on both sides of the garage, where we felt like we could have won the race.
“I think we’ve got the hardest part nailed. I think we’ve got an incredibly quick car. We just need to capitalise on using it.”
Piatri reflects on Silverstone miss
Piastri admitted that the choice not to pit both cars on the same lap was not an easy one for the team to make.
“I think, to be honest, that decision in that race is probably the hardest call you’re ever going to have in motor racing,” he said. “You’ve got two cars, one-two, separated by half a second with rain coming down. I don’t think it gets any harder than that.
“So I think clearly some things we need to review. I think double-stacking would have been the better call. But hindsight is a wonderful thing. I think we just need to see if we had any information that told us that was going to be a better choice. But obviously a little bit painful given the gap to Lewis.”
Asked if the double stack option was available, he said:
“Yes, it was. I think we just need to review if we put enough weight on that decision. Obviously when the two cars are so close like that, you lose a lot of time doing a double stack.
“The conditions were getting trickier, but it was very, very hard to judge. And it was only really half of the track that was really difficult, until the lap that I stayed out, and then the whole track became difficult.
“So just very, very difficult for everybody involved. But yes, I think in hindsight, double-stacking would have given us a very good chance of winning.
“Obviously frustrated at that point, but I knew that there was there was rain still coming. And after the first couple of laps, I could see that the cars ahead had clearly used up their inters a lot in the first couple of laps.
“So I was actually optimistic at that point, but then I kind of hit the same wall as everyone else.
“I knew we would have more chances later in the race, with getting back onto the slicks, the choice of tyres we had. So I knew there’d be more opportunity. So I just tried to give ourselves the best chance of still trying to win.”
The time loss at the pit stop was especially frustrating for Piastri, as the medium tyre choice for the final stint was a good one. It gave him good pace in the later stages.
“I think every other decision we absolutely nailed in that race,” he said. “I think me and Lando put ourselves in a great position getting to the lead.
“I think the decision on my side to put a medium on was the right call because I think we were the quickest at the end. So, yeah, just a shame that we weren’t in a better position in the middle of the race.”
Piastri agreed that adding downforce for qualifying with an eye on possible rain helped with the overall race performance.
“Honestly, I think we made a really good choice for that,” he said. “I think we added downforce into qualifying. We were struggling a little bit in the high-speed anyway in the dry. But with the chance of weather, I think we made a really good call on that.
“I think we made 99% of the decisions correct this weekend. Just I think probably one on my side with the pit stop and one on Lando’s with the tyre choice prevented a better result.”
