Piastri dismisses Monza qualifying effort

Oscar Piastri has denied that his Italian Grand Prix qualifying performance was his best of the season.

The McLaren MCL60 was not thought to be well-suited to the high-speed Monza layout, with Piastri and teammate Lando Norris having struggled with top-end performance two races ago at Spa.

Nevertheless, Piastri managed to stick his MCL60 seventh on the grid for Sunday's race, two places ahead of Norris, and also ahead of luminaries such as Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.

However, Piastri dismissed claims that this was his most impressive qualifying performance of his rookie F1 season.

Piastri pinpoints areas for improvement

"No, I don't think so," Piastri told media, including RacingNews365.com, when asked if his Monza qualifying was his best of the year.

"I think Q1 was not very good, to be honest. Last week in Zandvoort, I was happy with every lap up until the last one, and this weekend was probably the opposite – not that happy with all the laps until the last one.

"I'm glad it's that way around, but I think the last lap I did was pretty solid.

"Until that point, I felt like I hadn't really nailed a lap and I'd been struggling a little bit the whole weekend just to nail a lap.

"But I feel like when it mattered, I felt like I did a decent job today, so I can be happy with that.

"Obviously, we'd like to be a bit further up the front. Maybe that last lap in Q3 was one of my better ones, but on the whole, I wouldn't say it was the best of the year."