Oscar Piastri admits McLaren’s gamble ‘didn’t work’ at the F1 Belgian Grand Prix

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Oscar Piastri has admitted that McLaren took a gamble during qualifying for the 2024 Belgian Grand Prix but it backfired and cost the Formula 1 team heavily this Saturday.

The Woking outfit would only claim fifth place with Lando Norris and sixth with Piastri in the wet conditions. Rain drenched the Ardennes as attention turned to the fight for pole for the Belgian GP. It should not have hindered McLaren, however, having been fast in final practice.

Piastri was the second-fastest driver in FP3 this Saturday morning with Norris finishing in P4, as well. Yet they failed to repeat that pace in qualifying as Max Verstappen again topped the timesheet. But the Red Bull driver will start the Belgian GP from P11 owing to a grid penalty.

Oscar Piastri rues McLaren’s tyre strategy in qualifying for the Belgian GP

Verstappen’s penalty for taking power unit elements outside of the allowance will promote Norris to P4 and Piastri to P5 on the Belgian GP grid. The papaya team can work from those positions with a good start given their pace in practice and the tow on the Kemmel Straight.

But qualifying was ‘a shame’ for Piastri as the 23-year-old concedes he and McLaren did not do a good enough job at Spa. The Australian accepts he could have produced a better lap in Q3 than the 1:54.027 he posted. Verstappen topped the Q3 timesheet with a 1:53.159 tour.

READ MORE: Five unforgettable Belgian GP from Schumacher vs Hakkinen to a 13 car crash

Piastri also says McLaren’s gamble to use their only remaining set of new intermediate tyres at the start of Q3 backfired. The Woking squad expected more rain would hit Spa as the last phase of qualifying continued. But the track conditions actually improved as Q3 played out.

“I think the car is still quick, just a couple of mistakes from my side,” Piastri told Sky Sports F1 (27/7, 16:29). “Also, I think the tyre strategy we went for in Q3 in the end didn’t work.

“We expected it to rain maybe a bit more than it did and at that point, going straight for our last new set seemed like the sensible call. But, ultimately, I think it was just not quite enough rain for it to get worse. It still got a bit better. So, yeah, [it is] a bit of a shame.”

Lando Norris improved to usurp Oscar Piastri with his second Q3 run at Spa

Even though McLaren gave Piastri and Norris their remaining new sets of intermediate tyres for their first runs in Q3, the papaya pilots still only managed P4 and P6 respectively. Piastri’s time for fourth place was also 0.868s off Verstappen’s benchmark with Norris 1.086s slower.

Piastri then failed to improve his provisional time with the Australian’s final lap in qualifying for the 2024 Belgian GP. Norris, on the other hand, found 0.264 seconds to jump from P6 to P5 at his teammate’s expense. Piastri is losing the qualifying head-to-head at McLaren 11-3.

George Russell had initially split the McLaren pair after the first Q3 runs. But the Mercedes driver ultimately finished qualifying for the Belgian GP in P7 with Norris and Charles Leclerc improving. The Ferrari pilot rose from P8 to P2 and will take pole with Verstappen’s penalty.