Oscar Piastri ended his impressive qualifying streak during the Grand Prix weekend in Mexico. The Australian driver had made it to Q3 in every qualifying session up to the race in Mexico City in 2024, but couldn’t repeat this feat at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez. Piastri hopes he won’t have to start a race from so far back in the field again.
In Mexico City, Piastri failed to advance beyond Q1 in a qualifying session for the first time this season. The Australian went too wide in turn twelve. As a result, he exceeded the track limits, causing the McLaren driver to lose his fast lap. This marked the end of an impressive streak for the Australian. Piastri had consistently reached Q3 since the Grand Prix of Bahrain.
Moreover, the qualifying error made Sunday’s race even more challenging for the Melbourne-born driver. Piastri couldn’t immediately start overtaking the slower cars at the back of the field at the start. “You have to wait a bit until everything is a bit spread out,” the Australian explained to Auto Action. “Once it (the field) spread out, I was able to get through fairly quickly.”
New Experience
Since the Australian had always secured a top ten starting position in the rest of the season, the race in Mexico City was a completely new experience. “You’re just at the mercy of what the cars in front of you do. Hopefully, the tyres we tested in VT2 (in Mexico) will make it easier next year. But hopefully, I won’t have to start so far back again and can do better,” Piastri concluded.
