British GP: Oscar Piastri admits Lando Norris swapping back positions in British GP would have been unfair | F1 News

Oscar Piastri conceded that this would not have been just in Lando Norris so that his teammate lost victory in the British Grand Prix by McLaren granting his request to exchange their positions after his lead penalty.

The leader of the Piastri championship was left unusually angry by the 10-second sanction which was given to him by commissioners for an incident before the restart of the Tour-22 security car when they tried that he had braked too hard before Max Verstappen in the right hangar.

Having needed to serve the penalty during his next stand stop, Piastri was only two seconds in advance on Norris when he opposed Slicks, the Australian having to serve his 10s sanction in the McLaren pit box before the crew could work on his car.

Norris inherited the advance and then kept him when he opposed Slicks himself a tour later.

McLaren was also unhappy with the stewards’ decision – with the boss of the team Andrea Stella, later qualifying him as “very hard” – and Piastri asked the team radio with seven laps to do if, in case the team also thought it was unfair, they exchanged it and Norris.

Piastri’s racing engineer responded to three laps later that there would be no team order.

And speaking during the press conference after the race, while being unhappy with the penalty which cost him a probable victory in his title of oath in duel with Norris, he admitted that an exchange would not have been correct.

“I thought I would ask the question,” said Piastri. “I knew what the answer was going to be before asking.

“But I just wanted a little glimmer of hope that I could perhaps recover it. But no, I knew it was not going to happen.

“I don’t think there is something wrong with that. Lando did nothing wrong.

“I don’t think it would have been particularly fair to have exchanged, but I thought I would ask at least.”

‘Let’s just say’ – McLaren welcomed the Piastri exchange request despite not granting it

The boss of the Andrea Stella team explained that because of the philosophy of the opening of the team, they had no problem with the Piastri who made the request to retreat.

And although they finally decided not to grant it after the discussion on the Pit-Peu wall, Stella said that they allowed Piastri to hold her head on the right track because another period of security car would have finally meant that he could have stayed in advance anyway.

Stella said: “As a team and with Lando and Oscar, we always say to our drivers:” Do not keep things in your mind when you drive “. If you have a point, if you have a suggestion, if you want to tell us what you think, say it.

“Then we will assess it on the wall of the pit, make a decision and return to you.

“Oscar did exactly what we encourage our drivers to do. He communicated, he expressed his opinion, which we evaluated.

“The way we managed the situation today given the penalty was to allow Oscar, despite the penalty, in the event of a safety car to keep the advance.

“If there was a safety car, the two cars would have opposed [at the same time]Oscar would have paid the penalty, Lando would have waited and the two McLaren would have been extinct in the same corner as they arrived.

“But when we had to have the transition of dry tires, then the penalty was made, and at this stage, we thought we should simply keep the natural order.

“So I think it was just for both, and I’m sure Oscar will understand and accept this point of view.”

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