Oscar Piastri cut a dejected figure after finishing in P5 at the United States Grand Prix, as he struggled to understand why he lacked the pace of his Championship rivals.
The Australian was clearly off the pace all weekend long, especially in comparison to his nearest rivals in the Drivers' Championship, teammate Lando Norris and Red Bull's Max Verstappen.
From the Friday, the Championship leader struggled to get to grips with the handling characteristics of his McLaren MCL39, and thereby couldn't push the car to the maximum required for a fast lap come Saturday.
Ultimately, Piastri could only muster a lowly P6 in qualifying, lining up behind Verstappen and Norris as well as both Ferraris and George Russell's Mercedes.
The 24-year-old would have been hoping to climb back up the order on race day, but unfortunately things didn't quite turn out that way.
A poor start from Russell directly ahead allowed Piastri to gain one position on the opening lap, but the Aussie racer was subsequently unable to make an impression on Hamilton for fourth place, let alone challenge for a podium place.
In the end it was a lonely 56 laps for the McLaren driver, who crossed the line 22 seconds after Norris who claimed second place.
Piastri's advantage at the top of the Drivers' Standings has now dwindled to just 14 points ahead of Norris, with Verstappen only another 26 points behind.
Speaking to Sky Sports F1 after the Grand Prix, Piastri admitted that his subpar race pace was somewhat of a mystery.
He said: "Today race pace could have saved you [from a difficult qualifying] but I didn't really have that either.
"It's something I want to work on but qualifying has still generally been consistently good. There have obviously been the highs at certain points but this weekend, apart from Baku, has really been the first weekend where it has been a let down.
"Even if it has been sub-par before, it has still been pretty good. So some things to try and understand from this weekend because clearly it just wasn't related to qualifying," stated the Australian.
Piastri wants to immediately go back to the drawing board to uncover exactly why he wasn't able to extract the maximum performance out of the machinery beneath him.
He continued: "Trying to work out why it just didn't gel with the car this weekend is the first port of call, I guess.
"It was just difficult to get into a rhythm at all and that has been the big difference compared to other circuits we have been to, even recently."
With the Drivers' Title battle heating up race by race, Piastri was asked about the possibility of McLaren favouring one driver over the other to ensure at least one of them finishes ahead of Verstappen.
His answer was straightforward: "I don't know. I don't think so.
"We are still so incredibly tight and we've both said we wanted an opportunity to try and fight for the championship because we deserve it.
"So I think it's far too close to start picking one over the other," concluded Piastri.
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