Formula 1 championship leader Oscar Piastri struggles in qualifying for the US Grand Prix and will start third among the three title contenders – here’s why
After the McLaren fiasco in the sprint at the US weekend of the 2025 Formula 1 season, things didn’t go according to plan for championship leader Oscar Piastri in the subsequent qualifying for the Grand Prix either.
While Red Bull driver Max Verstappen took pole position for the Grand Prix just a few hours after his sprint victory, and Piastri’s McLaren teammate Lando Norris qualified second fastest for the front row, the championship leader himself will start Sunday’s main race from P6.
Why didn’t things go as planned for Piastri in qualifying? “The car was a bit unpredictable. I didn’t feel really comfortable at any point. That was the biggest problem,” said the Australian after the time trial, which took place in windy conditions in Austin late on Saturday afternoon.
As a result of the collision at the start of the sprint, which meant immediate retirement for both Piastri and Norris, the McLaren pit crew worked feverishly to repair the cars in time for qualifying. They succeeded. But did this circumstance possibly have something to do with the relatively poor performance of the championship leader in qualifying?
“I don’t think so,” says Piastri. “The car was completely restored, and as far as I know, the setup was also the one that was planned. Everything felt normal. The car just behaved the way we’ve seen it behave a few times this season.“
Piastri is referring to the ”unpredictability” of the MCL39 he described at the beginning. “My last lap,” he recalls of Q3, in which he was 0.283 seconds slower than teammate Norris, “my last lap was actually okay. But if you don’t have the confidence, it’s just hard to find those last few tenths of a second.”
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella commented on this to Sky Sports F1: “We talked to Oscar about rhythm in these windy conditions. And since we didn’t have any driving time in the morning [in the sprint], it just took him a little longer to find his rhythm.”
“In any case, he didn’t complain about the car as such, apart from the bumps, but that’s a well-known problem here in Austin,” says Stella, emphasizing that Piastri’s “main problem on Saturday was his rhythm and lack of confidence, especially in these gusty winds.”
Piastri’s struggles on Saturday in Austin were also noticed by the competition. Red Bull motorsport advisor Helmut Marko told Sky about Piastri: “He seems to be unsettled by the situation at the moment.”
And former Formula 1 driver Timo Glock also speculates in his role as a TV expert at Sky: “Either he doesn’t feel comfortable, doesn’t have the right feeling for the car or the tires, as he usually does. Or it’s just too much going on in his head at the moment.”
Glock at least partly blamed Piastri for the crash at the start of the sprint. Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff estimated Piastri’s responsibility for the incident in turn 1 at “30 percent,” while he saw “70 percent” on Nico Hülkenberg.
