Oscar Piastri has denied a remarkable suggestion that McLaren is trying to "sabotage" the Australian in the drivers' title fight.
Piastri enters this weekend's São Paulo Grand Prix on the back of a difficult double-header, which saw him fail to score big points in either Austin or Mexico City.
As a result, the 24-year-old has fallen behind Lando Norris in the championship for the first time in 15 grands prix; however, he finds himself only a point adrift.
With 116 points still up for grabs it is a deficit which can quickly be overcome, although it can also increase just as fast if he fails to rediscover some form in Interlagos.
Following Mexico City, Piastri does now have "clear answers" on what caused him to struggle so much, but opted against going into any detail over what himself and McLaren has discovered.
Crucially, he defended the Woking-based based team on media day in Brazil, when informed that Brazilian F1 fans believe McLaren is purposefully working against Piastri.
Told by a Brazilian journalist that the country believes he is being 'sabotaged' by McLaren, Piastri responded to select media including RacingNews365: "No, it's not the case.
"I think the last couple of weekends have been a little bit more tricky, but we've got pretty clear answers on why that's the case.
"There's not really too many mysteries on what's kind of happened. I think there's questions on kind of why some differences have propped up in terms of how I need to drive and stuff like that.
"But there's, yeah, everything is explainable. So there's definitely not that going on."
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