Piastri defends McLaren's strategy after losing pole to Verstappen

21:48, 19 Apr

Updated: 22:16, 19 Apr

byNorberto Mujica

McLaren's pace across the Jeddah race weekend looked rather powerful. However, during qualifying the papaya team fell to Red Bull Racing and Max Verstappen. Oscar Piastri does not think the strategy played a role in McLaren's defeat.

Due to Lando Norris' crash, most Q3 contenders first push lat attempts were neutralised due to the red flag. Max Verstappen's race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase gave the Dutchman the run plan that ended up helping the reigning world champion turn the qualifying tide to his favour.

Piastri pins F1 qualifying strategy decision due to circumstances

Piastri and McLaren considered the same strategy, but their situation made them decided against it, the Australian notes during the FIA post-qualifying press conference.

"We spoke about it, yes, but decided against it. I think, considering I had a lap on the board, I didn't need to put another one on there. And it was going to be extremely tight."

"As Max said, he had to fuel for the whole run. So that first lap on used tires with a bit more fuel, you just keep kind of weighing up how much you're learning and how much actually is it going to put you off."

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For Verstappen the situation was quite different, Piastri thinks, as the Dutchman was still to set a lap in Q3. "I think when you don't have a lap on the board, obviously it's a very different scenario.

"But for us with a lap on the board, we'd done like three or four new sets in a row. So yeah, we decided to just go for that single lap at the end. And I think for us it was the right decision."