Piastri 'a couple of mistakes' away from maiden pole

Oscar Piastri felt that just a couple of small mistakes on his final flying lap in qualifying for the Monaco Grand Prix had stopped him from pipping Charles Leclerc to pole position on Saturday.

The McLaren driver had been second quickest in FP1 on Friday and was top four again in final practice earlier on Saturday. When it came to qualifying he was second in Q1 to George Russell, third in Q2 and then on the front row in Q3.

But the Australian felt that he could have gone one better than P2 today and had been in with a chance to secure what would have been his maiden FR1 Grand Prix pole position.

On his final flier, Piastri matched Leclerc's time up to the tunnel section, having improved on his earlier Q3 lap by 0.13s. However he lost a significant fraction of that time in the final corners.

It left him posting a best time of 1:10.424s which proved 0.154s slower than the Ferrari meaning that he had to settle for second place on the grid. As good as that is, Piastri admitted that he felt he could have done better.

• Read also: Leclerc and Piastri on front row as Verstappen falters

“I think if you took the second half of my first lap in Q3 and the first half of the second one, it would have been enough,” he suggested when talking to the media in parc ferme afterward.

“Just a couple of mistakes at the end," he added. “But credit to Charles, he’s been incredibly quick all weekend.

"At certain points I don’t think anyone thought we were going to get close to him, so it’s nice to be starting on the front row," he added.

After his team mate Lando Norris won in Miami , Piastri got access to the latest McLaren upgrades last week and qualified in second place for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in Imola, only to get hit with a grid penalty dropping him to P5.

There's no risk of that this week and this time he will have a chance to strike at the pole sitter going into the tight first corner at Sainte Devote to try and gain the early upper hand in the Monaco GP.

“A good start always helps and if you can get into the lead, then you can control it very easily around here,” he acknowledged. “So that’s probably the first goal.

“If not then [we'll try to win it] with strategy," he added. "A bit of both, because as optimistic as I want to be, overtaking around here is not easy.

With Norris lining up right behind Piastri in P4, there's a chance for some team work to compete with the Ferraris on the other side of the grid. "We’ll try our best, both starting from a good spot. A chance for a good day tomorrow."

For once it's not Team Papaya this week, with McLaren running a special yellow and green livery, team helmets and race suits in honour of Ayrton Senna, the most successful driver of all time in Monaco.

“I feel like it’s been a good weekend in terms of building momentum and what better colours to do it in than these,” Piastri beamed.

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