McLaren secured their best result of the season so far at the Australian GP with Lando Norris in third and Oscar Piastri in fourth.
Andrea Stella, the McLaren boss, supported the team’s decision to bring in Oscar Piastri before their lead driver, Lando Norris, during the 2024 Australian Grand Prix. Unfortunately, Norris believes that this move ultimately cost him second place.
Charles Leclerc, on the other hand, took advantage of the situation and secured second place, marking Ferrari’s first 1-2 finish since the 2022 Bahrain GP, with Carlos Sainz leading the way. As Piastri battled with his tire degradation at the Albert Park Circuit, Leclerc managed to overtake both McLaren drivers in the pits.
Piastri exited the pitstop ahead of Norris, but McLaren made the decision to swap the drivers, resulting in the Australian missing out on the opportunity to become the first-ever home driver to secure a podium in Melbourne. Stella was questioned about the team’s chances of achieving second place.
“It is indeed a possibility,” Stella informed the press. “This assessment was made very early in the race when there was a significant level of uncertainty regarding the performance of the hard tires. As a matter of fact, we observed that some fast cars appeared to be struggling due to poor tire performance – one example being Perez’s Red Bull.”
We decided to adopt an assertive approach in our attempt to overtake Leclerc with Oscar. Surprisingly, Leclerc also seemed to think it was a viable option, possibly because he was tuning in to our radio communication.
Leclerc and Oscar were both eager to pass each other, resulting in a competitive situation between the two cars.
Stella: We couldn’t risk Lando
Despite the possibility of Norris surpassing Leclerc, it was impossible for him to catch up to the leading Ferrari of Sainz. Sainz, on the other hand, must be regretting his decision to have his appendix removed earlier.
Nevertheless, the unexpected retirement of the race favorite, Max Verstappen, was a highly unusual occurrence. Unfortunately, Norris failed to seize the opportunity to claim his inaugural grand prix victory, thereby setting an undesirable record.
Norris has achieved his 14th career podium, surpassing Nick Heidfeld in terms of most appearances on the rostrum. This includes seven instances as a runner-up without securing a victory. Stella mentioned that McLaren aimed to solidify the strong position of the British drivers in Melbourne and take a chance on Piastri.
Stella explained, “Considering Lando’s favorable position, we deemed it unnecessary to take such a risk. We would have been willing to gamble with Oscar, as we were confident that even if the tires degrade, the race would eventually play into our hands towards the end, allowing us to regain any lost positions, possibly on lap eight out of 58. There were still another 50 laps to go.”
Leclerc ended up ahead of Lando because their car is faster currently. The good news is that the speed advantage is not much. We were very close.
Japan can find encouragement in the fact that Australia possesses certain qualities that are beneficial for them. One of these qualities is the higher ratio of medium high speed compared to low speed, which is a positive step forward.
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