The Australian driver had announced his injury via his social media accounts at the beginning of the summer break, revealing that he had found out he had broken a rib the day before the British GP by posting a picture of his scan.
Piastri opened up on the injury in his first official media outing since the reveal, ahead of the Dutch GP round in Zandvoort. The McLaren driver mentioned that in his opinion the broken bone might have been caused by the ill-fitting driver seat, customised at the beginning of the season:
“You make the seat, obviously, at the start of the year and sometimes you get it a little bit wrong. Some tracks don’t expose it, but I think going from Barcelona, Austria, Silverstone, three pretty hardcore tracks [did expose it].”
The issue has been fixed ever since, following the intense physical strain it put on the 2021 Formula 2 Champion. Piastri was almost nonchalant in confirming the fact that he has restored his health over the summer break, allowing for the bone to mend.
“So it was just a bit of a pressure point which eventually gave up. But it’s all good again now and we’ve changed a seat and fixed it immediately pretty much. So yeah, all back to normal.”
The young driver, who has achieved his first ever Formula 1 race win following the injury in Hungary, was asked for a timeline of the issue, with Piastri admitting he had been in pain for long before he actually got a scan:
“The scan was the day after Silverstone but it was definitely broken before Silverstone.
“Three, I would say. But yes, definitely it was at some point around Austria,” expanded the Aussie on the exact number of races affected by the situation.
“I think it was probably a bit disturbed in Barcelona, and then with Austria afterwards it was pretty painful, so it was pretty nasty for a few days. But we made some changes and it was already getting better even with driving, so it’s all good.”
After the intense trio of European races his rib began to recover already and to stop hurting as much as before, which, paired with the accommodations made to fix the pre-existing issues.
“I think we identified what we could change on the seat and, even with it being broken, the pain subsided a lot once we changed a few things.
“Even with driving around Budapest and Spa it was not getting any worse, it was actually getting better,” concluded Piastri.
