Oscar Piastri sliced into Lando Norris’ lead, but made a mistake shortly after being instructed to hold position behind his teammate.

The McLarens were leading first and second on track during the Australian Grand Prix, when Oscar Piastri was given an order to hold position behind Lando Norris.

Zak Brown addresses Oscar Piastri instruction

While Oscar Piastri initially lost the initiative to Lando Norris on the opening lap as Max Verstappen got past the Australian, Piastri began making up for it through the middle part of the race after getting ahead of Verstappen when the Red Bull driver made a mistake on his worn intermediate tyres.

Piastri slowly but surely began slicing into Norris’ lead, and had got within DRS range of his teammate when he was given a radio instruction by his race engineer to hold position behind Norris – seemingly at odds with the pre-race messaging that the two drivers would be free to race each other.

Piastri accepted the message, pointing out that he “was quicker” than Norris, but remained steadfast behind his teammate without attacking as the pair worked their way through some backmarker traffic. Piastri’s pending attack then faded as he made a mistake at Turn and had to back off the throttle to re-settle the car – a similar mistake from Fernando Alonso just a few minutes later resulted in a Safety Car intervention.

Speaking to Sky F1 after the chequered flag, McLaren CEO Zak Brown was asked whether he felt Piastri’s rhythm had been put off by the instruction to hold station.

“I don’t think that had anything to do with it,” he said, before explaining that the hold position instruction had only been temporary while the two cars came through the traffic.

“We – Andrea and I on the pit wall – actually just kind of released him to go racing, and we just wanted to make sure we cleared the traffic.

“So that was a hold for a moment, and then it looked like he dropped a wheel and then fell back a bit of a gap.

“But I just think they were pushing really hard in very tricky conditions.”

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Zak Brown: I felt terrible for Oscar Piastri

Piastri’s race fell apart shortly after the Safety Car, as both he and Norris went off track in the final sector as they encountered the first wet bit of tarmac as rain began to fall at Albert Park.

While Norris managed to regroup and get back on track without losing position, Piastri slid into the grass and got stuck – he recovered to eventually finish ninth.

“I feel terrible for Oscar. He drove such a brilliant race and they both came up on that rain at the same time,” Brown said.

“Lando was able to collect it up. For Oscar, a little bit more tricky, and he drove great to get back to P9 but [an] awesome team effort in an exciting race.”

With McLaren romping away from Verstappen in the stable drying conditions through the first stint, Brown was quick to point out that one swallow does not a summer make.

“It looked good, but, as we know, that’s one track, one race. Let’s see what happens in China,” he said.

“But definitely, we’re starting the season very strong. But we saw, last year, Max won the first six, seven races (sic), whatever it was, and then had a bit of a drought. So I think we just got to keep doing what we’re doing.”

With Norris going on to withstand the pressure applied by Verstappen to take the win and lead the Drivers’ Championship, Brown said it had been a tough day to figure out the best tyre option for any given moment.

“Unbelievable drive, the team called a perfect strategy in very difficult conditions,” he said.

“It was really tough because of the rain. We kept thinking it was going to come, might not come. How bad is it going to be? How long is it going to be?

“We just had to react to the circumstances. So the team did a great job. Everyone back at McLaren, all the men and women, they built a proper race car.”

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