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Oscar Piastri reacts to disappointing sprint qualifying in Austin

Oscar Piastri reacts to his surprise SQ1 elimination in Austin

Today at 01:30
  • Matt Gretton
  • Editor-in-Chief

Oscar Piastri failed to escape SQ1 in Austin, making it very difficult for McLaren to score a decent chunk of points on Saturday. The Australian will start from 16th on the grid, and will have to move up to P8 to score a point. Piastri explained what went wrong.

What went wrong for Piastri in sprint qualifying?

Piastri had set a good enough time, but it was deleted as he exceeded track limits. "Most of the lap was good. Made a few mistakes in the last sector. Second to last corner, just tried to go a bit too fast. And this is the result. So, it's a shame. But if there's one good thing about spring weekends, it's that we have another shot tomorrow [Saturday]," Piastri said.

Many teams, including Red Bull, have introduced upgrades this weekend. "It [McLaren car] feels okay. Maybe not quite as strong as what it has in the last few races but I don't think that's because we're weaker. I think the others seem a little bit stronger maybe," he added. Though Piastri is not too downbeat about the result."

"We're still well and truly in the fight. It's certainly not a case of we're miles behind, but it's maybe a little bit more difficult for us than a few of the other weekends. It's going to be tough, definitely, to get to the points from where we are. But we'll try. We'll see what we can do," Piastri concluded.