The two frustrating mistakes that saw Oscar Piastri almost WRECK his McLaren and eliminated from qualifying at United States Grand Prix
- The Australian F1 star took part in training during the United States GP
- Finished 16th after exceeding track limits
- It could have been a lot worse after another big mistake
A frustrated Oscar Piastri has been eliminated from qualifying after the first practice session of the United States GP, but the Australian F1 star can probably count his lucky stars it couldn’t have been much worse.
It wasn’t the Aussie’s day as he went off track at Turn 19 of sprint qualifying, eliminating him and relegating him to 16th on the grid.
But it was another incident that caused Piastri even more concern after he came dangerously close to crashing his McLaren into a barrier following a pit lane incident gone wrong.
The United States GP only allows drivers one session to calibrate their vehicles in a sprint format, so the majority of drivers pitted towards the end of practice for a new set of soft tires to simulate a qualifying run.
This also applies to Piastri, but he came in too hot and had to pull out at the last second, narrowly avoiding a big crash in the barrier between the pit lane and the main circuit.
A relieved Piastri reported the incident and was praised by his race engineer for avoiding a costly collision.
“We saw what happened – well done to prevent the accident,” he said.
Piastri misjudges a corner during the United States Grand Prix and exceeds track limits, costing him a lot of money on the grid for the sprint race
Piastri had a day to forget in practice, nearly crashing as he entered the pit lane and veered off track to earn a penalty ahead of the sprint race
The session was a write-off for the Aussie anyway, after he misjudged Turn 19 and was penalized for going off track.
‘It is clearly a disappointing start to the sprint qualifying. The car looks like it has plenty of speed,” said McLaren CEO Zak Brown.
‘Unfortunately Oscar lost his lap there, he was comfortable. Tomorrow is a long day.
‘Drivers are not completely satisfied with the driving behavior of the car. That angle gets some people caught.”
Piastri said: ‘Most of the lap was good. I made a few mistakes in the last sector and tried to go a little too fast.
‘Too bad, but the only good thing about sprint weekends is that we still have a chance tomorrow. It feels good.’
A vision from Piastri’s cockpit shows how close he came to crashing into the barrier
It is the second time this year that Piastri has experienced problems with pitting.
At the Belgian Grand Prix in August, the Australian almost caused a dangerous incident when he pitted from the lead on lap 31 and overshot his box.
“I just went in a little warm,” he said at the time.
‘I felt like there was a lot of grip in the pit lane on Friday and I was always under the box.
“Even on my first pit stop I probably undershot it a little bit.
‘I had to brake a bit, with Lewis [Hamilton] I came out, so maybe I came in a little slow. but the second was clearly a bit exaggerated.
‘It wasn’t my finest moment.’
The United States GP is one of six of 24 events this season that have been designated as F1 Sprint events and Red Bull champion Max Verstappen has won all three sprint races so far this year.
He qualified third behind Ferrari duo Carlos Sainz and teammate Charles Leclerc.
‘We had a good day. “I’m happy, the car worked quite well, very happy to be first, it’s been a while,” said Verstappen.
“It’s not easy, it’s not the easiest thing to deal with in one round, but it’s fun.
‘We will do our best in the sprint, but the most points can be achieved on Sunday.’