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oscar piastri Admitted he was frustrated by his lack of pace after another tough qualifying session f1 Championship leader.
Piastri has taken a lead of 14 points mclaren TeamMite lando norris And 40 points ahead of Red Bull max verstappenhas suffered a poor run of form and Saturday at the Mexico GP was no different.
piastre could Qualify only eighth fastest In the final top-10 shootout, however, Carlos Sainz would start from seventh place due to a five-place grid penalty.
Norris, meanwhile, took an impressive pole position with Verstappen finishing only fifth A wonderful day for the BritonsWhose eyes are now on scoring big points on Sunday.
Asked where he thought the car’s problems were, Piastri was unable to provide any clarity, telling Sky Sports: “It all feels fine, there’s just no pace. It’s a bit of a mystery.
“It’s been more or less the difference all weekend, we’ll see where things go wrong. Obviously a bit frustrating.”
Asked to elaborate further on how the car feels different from the beginning of the year: “It’s not a huge amount to be honest, this weekend and last weekend it felt like the pace wasn’t there. Not 100% sure why yet, we’ll do some digging.
“We will try our best [at the start]”This will be an opportunity to make some progress going forward, so we’ll see what we can do.”
While no obvious issues have been identified to explain the difference between the two McLaren drivers in Mexico City, team principal Andrea Stella admitted the Australian has struggled on slippery tracks, such as in Mexico and last week in Austin.
“Lando maxed it out, but it’s more difficult for Oscar to use the car when conditions are getting worse,” Stella said.
“It’s something we need to review before tomorrow. It’s more that he feels right with these conditions and pushing a little more at every corner.
“But it’s difficult not to have problems. I’m sure Oscar will improve some situations, it’s important for McLaren and important for its championship.”
However, Max Verstappen said Red Bull had taken a step back after their recent wins in Monza, Azerbaijan and Austin.
Asked what the problems were with the RB21, given their fifth-place qualification, the Dutchman replied: “If we had known, we would have changed it, unfortunately we don’t know, we’ve tried a lot of things, but it hasn’t been good.
“It’s not a lack of trying, it’s just not finding it. We tried to do something again, we didn’t get it quite right, it didn’t allow me to move forward, I already knew from Q1 it wasn’t going to happen.
“Basically everything we tried didn’t really work.”
Verstappen said before the race: “When we have no speed, no recovery drive, I need to retire people to move forward.
“It’s not going to suddenly change tomorrow.”
If Norris wins the race and Verstappen (fifth) and Piastri (seventh) finish in their current positions, the Briton will lead the world championship by five points with four races remaining.