Oscar Piastri issues McLaren test relief after costly problem

Oscar Piastri has expressed his relief at enjoying a smooth morning session on Friday, following a difficult week in Barcelona for McLaren.

The five-day test at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya did not go entirely to plan for the Woking-based outfit, with significant time lost on Thursday.

McLaren did not run until Wednesday and then lost the entirety of Thursday afternoon after a fuel system issue while Piastri was in the car.

To Piastri’s relief, the problem was fixed in time for him to drive on Friday morning, with the Australian completing 80 laps and dipping into the mid-1m 17s.

It offered Piastri a genuine opportunity to gain significant mileage in the MCL40 ahead of the two three-day tests in Bahrain.

Thanks to the volume of trouble-free running on Friday, Piastri was finally able to get into a rhythm.

Asked how his morning went, Piastri said: "Yeah, it was good — nice to get some good laps on the board this morning. Much smoother day than the first two we've had, so that was nice.

"And yeah, I got into a pretty good rhythm and was able to start to feel what the car is actually like, which was good. I tried a few things already to see how we can improve it and things like that.

"But we're just trying to run it in different configurations and different settings to see what it's like for race weekends.

"So, all in all, I think it was a pretty successful morning."