Piastri points to slow stop, pace drop in Dutch Grand Prix sixth
NXTbets Pro | Published On: August 26, 2026
Piastri struggles
Oscar Piastri finished sixth at the Dutch Grand Prix and left Zandvoort calling the race “painful” after a weekend that never fully came together. He said he was still searching for speed and could not extract the same pace from McLaren’s Formula 1 package that Lando Norris found. A slow pit stop hurt the race in a major way, and Piastri said the drop in pace after that stop mattered more than the strategy call. He started on the second row and briefly moved forward after the red-flag restart, passing George Russell and Charles Leclerc, but the gain did not last. His second stint on hard tires did nothing to lift the pace, and the final result left him trying to piece together where the performance went.
Stella explains
Team principal Andrea Stella said Piastri’s troubles came down to technique more than mindset. He said the Australian needs to adapt his driving style when grip is low and cannot always rely on pure instinct. Stella also pointed to McLaren’s issues with the second set of hard tires, which never reached the right operating window. That left Piastri fighting the car at a stage of the race when he needed clean pace most. Stella said he was encouraged by the progress Piastri showed over the weekend, even with the final result leaving plenty of work ahead. He also said the 2026 cars are different enough that Piastri’s two DNS results early in the season may have left him with a data disadvantage. That detail fit with Stella’s larger view of the problem. The team sees the issue as one of adaptation and setup, not one of confidence or commitment.
Norris delivers
Norris gave McLaren the result it wanted at the front of the field. He took pole position at Zandvoort and turned it into a win for the team. That made the contrast inside McLaren clear. Norris controlled the front end of the weekend, while Piastri spent much of Sunday trying to recover ground after his own race unraveled. Piastri said McLaren’s strategy was worse than some rivals’ strategies, but he put more weight on the slow stop and the lack of pace that followed. The hard-tyre phase also exposed the gap between the two McLaren drivers. Norris kept the pace at the front. Piastri lost it after the restart gains and never found enough speed to challenge again. The result gave McLaren the victory, but it also left a clear snapshot of the work ahead for Piastri as the team pushes through the rest of the season.
