‘There are so many things to get to grips with’ – Piastri focused on learning from ‘pretty smooth’ FP2

Oscar Piastri seemed to temper expectations despite setting the pace in FP2, reporting that the complexity of the new cars will see everyone “find a big step” ahead of a crucial Qualifying hour for the Australian Grand Prix.

The McLaren driver set the fastest time of Friday’s running at his home event, edging out Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli and George Russell to lead the field with a 1m 19.729s lap – a significant improvement on his effort in FP1, during which he reported having “no power”.

Piastri managed to iron out the issues in the second session of the day, largely avoiding the errors that impacted his competitors, but he nevertheless made it clear that he still has plenty to learn ahead of the remainder of the weekend.

“I think FP2, certainly on my side, went a lot smoother than FP1,” he said. “There are just so many things to get to grips with. It’s very different to what we had last year, but I think FP2 as a session was pretty smooth.

“I was able to build some consistency and start learning properly which was good. We’ll try and see what we’ve learned today – I think everyone’s going to find a big step overnight so I think we need to try and do the same.”

Although he had an advantage of just over two-tenths to Antonelli, he was reluctant to predict whether he will be in the fight for pole position due to changes that McLaren and others could make before Qualifying.

Quizzed on whether he could be a contender for pole, Piastri replied: “The front few rows hopefully – whether it’s pole or not, I don’t know. I’ve not seen what our race pace or long run pace look like.

“I’m not sure it was as good as some others around us but I think we looked okay. I think the biggest thing at the moment is just trying to build consistency, make things operate the way they should, and in FP2 it felt like we were able to get closer to doing that.”

Rob Marshall, McLaren Chief Designer, echoed Piastri’s sentiments around their progress throughout the sessions, and added that the work done overnight will be critical in determining the Qualifying order on Saturday.

“We didn't hit the ground running,” Marshall said. “It still looks pretty competitive out there – there are a lot of quick cars so I wouldn’t draw any conclusions just yet. There’s a long way to go this weekend.

“Getting these cars dialled in is difficult, and getting the energy management right is very tricky. I think everyone’s got a bit more work to do tonight on that topic in particular. As regards getting the car dialled in in a traditional manner, I think we’ve found a reasonable place where the car’s behaving itself.”