McLaren Racing driver Oscar Piastri was outperformed by his teammate Lando Norris, who went on to win the Hungarian Grand Prix. Piastri secured P2 despite a hard fight in the closing laps of the race as Norris held his position confidently.
The race at the Hungaroring went through several unexpected turns since it was Charles Leclerc who started the Grand Prix on pole position, followed by Piastri in second, and Norris in third.
Norris even lost two positions in the opening lap to Fernando Alonso and George Russell, but excellent tire management and a flawless one-stop strategy paved the way to his victory. The second half saw Norris lead the race after Leclerc and Piastri pitted.
However, Leclerc’s pace dropped significantly when he was in second, leading Piastri to capitalize on his setback and pass him in no time. Leclerc was even passed by Russell in the closing laps, who then went on to secure third place on the podium.
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Piastri closed the eight-odd-second gap to Norris since he was on fresher hard compound tires compared to his teammate. The last few laps saw a hard battle between the two drivers, with the gap hovering around the half-second mark. Piastri even locked up momentarily under braking at Turn 1 in the penultimate lap, but failed to overtake Norris.
Speaking after the race, the Australian driver highlighted the difficulty in overtaking at the Hungaroring. He said:
“I pushed as hard as I could. After I saw Lando going for a one-stop, I knew I was going to have to overtake on track, which is much easier said than done around here.
“It was a gamble either way. Today, unfortunately, we were just on the wrong side of it. The team did a great job, the car came alive in the second half of the race. The car’s been great all weekend. Thank you to the team.”
When asked if he was surprised by Norris’s decision to go for a one-stop strategy, he said:
“Yes and no. At that point, he didn’t have much to lose, so it wasn’t a huge surprise. I don’t know if trying to undercut Leclerc was the right call in the end. We can go through it after.”
On the topic of locking his brakes while chasing Norris, Piastri was asked if he should have waited for the perfect moment to overtake on the last lap, rather than going in fully on the penultimate lap. He said:
“I think I needed to be at least a couple of tenths closer which was going to take a mistake from Lando to achieve that. I felt that was going to be my best chance. You never want to try and save it for the next lap, then it never comes, so I thought I would at least try..not quite.”
Through his victory, Norris narrowed the gap to championship leader Piastri in the Drivers’ Standings to just 16 points.