Oscar Piastri finished the Las Vegas GP in 7th place, over 51 seconds off the lead.
In a season where he’s won 2 races and is 4th in the standings, this was far from a success.
His teammate Lando Norris finished 6th and 43 seconds off Russell, officially losing the World Drivers’ Championship to Max Verstappen.
The McLaren duo currently leads the World Constructors’ Championship, but saw their lead on Ferrari decrease as the red cars finished in 3rd and 4th.
Early struggles and tyre graining
Piastri and McLaren’s struggles began in qualifying at the Las Vegas GP. After looking quick in Q1 and Q2, the end of the Q3 saw Piastri and Norris at P8 and P6, respectively.
Based on this, the Australian driver had expected the race to be difficult.
The difficulties began early in the race, when Piastri was handed a 5-second penalty for a false start.
The replay showed that he was minutely out of his grid box.
When asked about the penalty’s effect, the Aussie replied, “Yeah, I mean, it made a little bit of an impact at the start after the first pit stop, but that was nowhere near the biggest problem I had tonight.”
The 23-year-old cited his main issue as tyre graining, something that he struggled with even more than he had been anticipating.
In fact, he was under pressure from Nico Hülkenberg, and was passed by Yuki Tsunoda in the first stint because of it. Ultimately he beat them both to finish P7.
“I think especially on my side it was a much, much more difficult race with the tyres than I expected going in.
“I mean, we knew it would be tough with graining, but the graining was a lot, lot worse than I feared.
“So yeah, that part was quite unexpected, so I think we need to understand why that was the case.”
McLaren’s new focus
After this difficult weekend and the conclusion of the Driver’s Championship, McLaren will be shifting their full focus to maintaining their Constructors’ Championship lead of 24 points in the final two events.
McLaren has not won the Constructors’ Championship since 1998, when Mika Häkkinen and David Coulthard drove for the team.
“It’s a massive deal for everybody. You know, we’ve not won a Constructors’ Championship for over 25 years, so it would mean a lot.
“And I think, for myself, it’s definitely a cool thing to be able to help the team achieve if that’s what we do.
“So, of course, we want to be a bit higher up in the drivers’ standings too, but obviously there’s not that much to play for in that championship now.
“So the full focus on the Constructors.”
Next weekend’s race is in Qatar, a circuit that Piastri and McLaren excelled at last year, with Piastri soaring to a maiden F1 Sprint win.
However, the driver from Melbourne cautions against going into the weekend too confident.
“It was obviously good for us last year, but yeah, we can’t just assume that it’s going to be good for us and that everything will be fine.
“I think we need to be on our toes and make sure that we put in the hard work in the next few days and come out strong there and try and build the gap again.”
There is no doubt that Piastri, Norris, and McLaren will be doing everything they can to prepare for Qatar.
They hope to secure McLaren’s first Constructors’ Championship in 26 years, before either of their current drivers were born.
Ferrari has looked quick, so the title fight will not be an easy one.
