Oscar Piastri tenth in Baku qualifying after upgraded McLaren "just faster"

Oscar Piastri will start the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in tenth on count-back after setting an identical lap time to Lance Stroll but says the upgraded McLaren MCL60 is performing well.

The two drivers set the same lap time to the thousandth of a second, with Stroll taking ninth as he set the time first in qualifying for Sunday's grand prix.

It was an extremely positive session for McLaren with both drivers into Q3 after a difficult start to the 2023 season, with the last parts of this year's "launch" car only installed this week.

"The car is feeling good," said Piastri after qualifying.

"It was a small surprise to have both of us in Q3, reasonably well. The car's performing well, I thought my performance was pretty good, but we had run out of tyres at the end so that compromised us a little bit."

Piastri's identical lap time to Stroll was coincidentally the second time a tie-breaker was needed during the session, with pole-sitter Charles Leclerc initially setting an identical time to Max Verstappen on the first runs of Q3.

It was dampened slightly by the fact that both Aston Martin cars were having issues with DRS activation, losing speed over the long final straight. Despite this, Piastri was positive that McLaren now seems to have a car that compete with Aston Martin, who were seen as the surprise frontrunners of the midfield in the first three races.

"Doing the same lap time as Lance hurts a little bit, but all-in-all a good day, a good start to the weekend," said Piastri.

The Australian has had a horrible start to the 2023 Formula 1 season, with mechanical issues in both Bahrain and Jeddah. The fortunes of his rookie year appear to be turning around, with his first points at home in Australia, and now the ability to compete with the upgraded McLaren MCL60. The Woking-based team admitted at the start of the year they would launch with an incomplete car after delays in preparation left them without key aerodynamic components.

Now, says Piastri, "it feels really good."

"In terms of balance and behaviour, pretty similar to how it was previously, just faster. That's a good place to be in."

"I don't know if our car is just working well here with the new tarmac, or if these upgrades are working a bit better than we thought, but it seems to be a good step forward which is really encouraging for the rest of the year."

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