"I think the magnitude of the struggle has been bigger than what makes sense": Oscar Piastri on his deficit to Lando Norris at F1 Spanish GP

Oscar Piastri reflected on his performance at the recently concluded Spanish Grand Prix. Piastri had an underwhelming outing at Barcelona and the McLaren driver had no explanation at the moment for what made him fall drastically behind his teammate Lando Norris.

Formula 1 concluded its 10th race of the season in Spain where Max Verstappen claimed the victory and Norris and Lewis Hamilton completed the podium. While Norris took all the plaudits with his performance at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, it proved otherwise for Piastri.

The British driver claimed the second pole position of his career after getting the better of Verstappen. In the race, he claimed a much-respected P2. Compared to him, the Australian driver had his worst qualifying of the season as he qualified in P9 on Saturday. In the race, Piastri finished in P7.

However, Piastri could not decode what made him fall back. He said in the post-race interview,

“I think some things are explainable. Some things make maybe not [making] quite as much sense at the moment, but we’ve not really looked at it in that much detail. So I think some hints here and there, but I think the magnitude of the struggle has been bigger than what makes sense at the moment, so just need to understand why that was the case.”

He went on to explain the difficulties he faced during the race.

“A bit of a difficult weekend, obviously. I think P7 was looking pretty realistic going into the race, obviously got close to Carlos at the end, but just didn’t quite have the pace this weekend in general, so need to understand why that was the case. Obviously, when you qualify that far back, it makes life very tough, so just need to understand why it’s been so difficult,” he added.

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Oscar Piastri had no answers for poor pace in Spain

The Spanish Grand Prix qualifying showed the two McLarens in entirely different modes. While Lando Norris was flying with his Papaya Challenger, that wasn't the case with Oscar Piastri.

Second placed Lando Norris of Great Britain and McLaren smiles with his trophy and teammate Oscar Piastri of Australia and McLaren after the F1 Grand Prix of Spain at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on June 23, 2024 in Barcelona, Spain. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)

The Australian driver was struggling unconventionally as he failed to make a mark in qualifying. Besides a couple of on-track errors that jeopardized his flying lap, Piastri's Q3 performance wasn't one to remember.

The Aussie was over 1.159 seconds slower than his pole-sitter teammate. Oscar Piastri is currently in P6 with 87 points after 10 races. Compared to him, Lando Norris is in P3 with 148 points.