Oscar Piastri capped off yet another fine rookie performance with a tenth place on the slippery streets of Monte-Carlo. Despite finishing a lap down on winner Max Verstappen, he didn’t make any mistakes. Although he admitted after the race that he was slightly distracted by team radio at one point.
“I don’t think there was any touches, but some very close moments – especially on the slicks. One time, I keyed up the radio to talk and almost put it in the wall mid-sentence. I won’t do that next time! But a few close calls.”
The fact he had to let the reigning world champion by had an advantage according to Oscar.
“Having Max right in front of me was actually quite useful in some ways, because that was my first time on slicks on a rainy track in an F1 car.”
The Aussie added: “Having Max there, I obviously knew that if there’s going to be anyone, that’s probably going to be OK.”
In the initial stages of the rain shower the McLaren driver was able to keep up with his Red Bull colleague, but once the intermediates began to create a drier line, Verstappen managed to pull away.
“When it was raining on the slicks, understandably, he was being very cautious. I could keep with him quite well there. Even when we came out on inters, I could keep with him quite well. Once the track dried up and he got a bit more comfortable, then he was a fair bit quicker. But initially, I was managing to keep behind him, which is the best I’ve been able to say that. So, it was nice.”
Piastri’s teamboss Andrea Stella lauded his rookie driver for making significant progress.
“I think the first remarkable step forward during this weekend was yesterday in qualifying,” he said. “Obviously up until the last session before qualifying he was more than half a second off Lando’s pace with a bit of head scratching as to how we good we go in qualifying. Instead, in Q1, he’s already competitive. We have this sense, we have an objective, we go and get it. That seems to be working very well with Oscar right from the start.”
He added that was impressed with the youngster’s ability to stay out of trouble in the difficult circumstances in Monaco.
“And then in the race, there was, if anything, another element of building the race craft, which is a racing situation in which you need to first, keep it on track with no mistakes on dry tyres on a track that is getting wet, and quite wet in some places. And then finding the rhythm in between the walls on intermediate tyres. So to be honest, for being a rookie, this is going to the most of the mystic plan we could anticipate for Oscar.”
