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'Not going to be a slam-dunk win' for McLaren in Canada
Oscar Piastri believes he’s in the fight for victory at the Canadian Grand Prix but it’s not a slam dunk win for McLaren this weekend given the competitive picture.
George Russell will start from pole position with Max Verstappen alongside him, marking the first time there hasn’t been a McLaren on the front row for a grand prix this season. Piastri goes from third with teammate Lando Norris in seventh, but the championship leader felt far more confident in his car in qualifying that he had been at any other stage in the weekend.
“Friday didn’t look great in any run, but I certainly feel more comfortable now than I did this morning and then yesterday,” Piastri said. “Our pace on race days is generally where we’re strong. These two next to me (Russell and Verstappen) were very quick in the race runs yesterday, so it’s certainly not going to be a slam dunk win, but I think we’re definitely in the fight.”
Piastri has been accustomed to fighting for pole position and ran soft tires compared to the mediums used by the top two at the end of Q3, but was pleased with his recovery after a challenging start to the weekend.
“Honestly, I’m quite happy here in P3," he said. "After all the practice sessions, I was struggling, obviously. I didn’t have a smooth session this morning, and everything just felt more back to normal. In qualifying, everything came alive again.
“So there’ll always be the question – should we have gone for a medium at the end? But I think with how we’d been going in practice, having just a clean run on the same compound seemed like the best idea for us, and honestly, I think it worked well. Honestly, pretty happy.”
The front row pairing collided in Spain last time out and Norris is hoping for plenty of drama on Sunday starting from seventh, as he also feels his car is unlikely to have a significant pace advantage to be able to climb through quickly.
“Just a couple of big mistakes,” Norris said of his qualifying. “One, hitting the wall on the last lap in the exit of [Turn 7]. And first lap, it was the last corner. Just two mistakes that cost me, I guess … it's a very easy track to just push one percent too much and pay the price and that's what I did today.
“I think we've clearly not been as quick as normal. I think that's just because of the layout of the track. The car’s been performing relatively well and I was happy through all the qualifying. Maybe not the car to take pole today, but good enough to be up there and fighting for top three.
“[Drama] would make my race a bit more interesting, and the more opportunity that comes my way, the better tomorrow. I mean, I think we can go forwards anyway, but not a lot. It’s not like we're easy one-two, like we have been on other tracks. It's going to be a bit more difficult. But anything that can help us will be very welcome.”
Chris Medland
While studying Sports Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, Chris managed to talk his way into working at the British Grand Prix in 2008 and was retained for three years before joining ESPN F1 as Assistant Editor. After three further years at ESPN, a spell as F1 Editor at Crash Media Group was followed by the major task of launching F1i.com’s English-language website and running it as Editor. Present at every race since the start of 2014, he has continued building his freelance portfolio, working with international titles. As well as writing for RACER, his broadcast work includes television appearances on F1 TV and as a presenter and reporter on North America's live radio coverage on SiriusXM.
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