Piastri blames Stroll, pleased with points

Oscar Piastri has stood up for his fellow Australian and said Lance Stroll caused the carnage at the hairpin which affected his Chinese Grand Prix.

As the field entered the hairpin ahead of the first Safety Car restart on Lap 26, Fernando Alonso locked up, causing a chain reaction.

Despite some close calls, George Russell, Piastri and Daniel Ricciardo all reacted and avoided drama.

However, Lance Stroll was not paying attention and drove straight into the back of Ricciardo, punting the Perth driver into his compatriot Piastri directly ahead.

Despite Stroll claiming it was a “weird racing incident” under Safety Car and labelling the Racing Bulls driver as an “idiot” over the radio, the Canadian appeared to be looking at the hairpin whilst he was at least a car length away from the #3.

Stroll refused to take blame for the incident, but Piastri, who was also affected by the concertina, does not agree.

“Yes, but everyone else didn’t crash into each other,” Piastri said. 

“In that kind of corner, you always kind of need to expect that but, yes, it did get quite close between a lot of us.”

Due to less substantial contact between Ricciardo and Piastri, the #81 McLaren suffered significant diffuser damage.

Despite the setback, Piastri was still able to get home in the points and finish eighth, just ahead of Lewis Hamilton.

The Aussie was pleased to keep his points-scoring streak in 2024 intact.

“It was very hard,” Piastri said. 

“I looked at the car afterwards and my diffuser – I’m pretty sure that’s not how the engineers designed it! 

“So, unsurprisingly I lost so much pace from that point, which is a shame because I think some good points were on offer today.

“I think it’s been a decent weekend. Qualifying was pretty strong, the first stint was looking OK – still some things to improve on. 

“But the second half of the race it’s impossible to compare. “Still learning and still making progress, but clearly still some things to find.”

Although Piastri’s second half of the race was negated by the Stroll incident, he was unable to match the pace of McLaren teammate Lando Norris who took an impressive second place splitting the Red Bulls.

Photo by Mark Sutton / Sutton Images/LAT Images

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