Piastri doubted being able to beat Verstappen

07:39, 18 May

Updated: 08:19, 18 May

bySavannah Lenz

Oscar Piastri took pole position for the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix. Afterwards, he mentioned how both the lap and trying to beat Max Verstappen felt.

In the press conference after qualifying, Piastri was joined by Verstappen and George Russell.

When asked how completing his lap felt from the cockpit, Piastri said, “It was good. I was happy with it.”

'Tough to beat'

“I feel like in Q3 I really found my groove. It wasn’t the easiest of days, really. FP3, Everyone put the Soft tyre on and started scratching their heads a bit, and then qualifying itself obviously had a lot of red flags, a lot of long delays. It was hard to build into a rhythm.”

Oscar Piastri at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix

Piastri continued, "By Q3, I found my feet, and the last lap of Q3 was a good one. I thought it was going to unravel at the last corner with a few people trying to start their laps, but it was enough to get through there and still get pole.”

Piastri admits about Verstappen’s fastest lap, “I thought it was going to be tough to beat.”

“When I got back to the garage, I saw that there were a few things that could have been a bit better. I found a little bit in a few places, and that was enough in the end. It felt like I definitely had to find a bit more for that final run, and I did a good job doing it.”