Piastri dismisses McLaren rear wing theory

Oscar Piastri has dismissed the idea that McLaren’s rear wing is the “magic bullet” behind its strong performances in F1.

During the Azerbaijan GP, Piastri was leading from Charles Leclerc, who could not pass the McLaren, with on-board footage later showing the rear wing appeared to flex at high speed to give the effect of DRS even though Piastri was not within a second of any backmarker.

It comes as a debate around flexi-wings has started, with the FIA monitoring the flex of all wings across the field, with no design yet found to fail the standard tests, with the governing body releasing a statement ahead of the Singapore GP over McLaren’s rear wing. 

When questioned about it, Piastri insisted that the design is not fully responsible for the pace the MCL38 has.

“Well, it is legal,” Piastri told media including RacingNews365. 

“As long as it passes all the tests – and we get tested a lot, it passes, so it is certainly not the magic ticket or magic bullet for why we’re competitive. 

“It is legal, it passes all the tests, so I am pretty happy with it.”

Piastri’s defence

When pushed further by RacingNews365, Piastri insisted that the first time he knew the wing flexed was after the Baku race, and that it was an example of McLaren pushing the technical rules. 

“To be honest, the first time I knew it did that was the same time as everyone else last week, and it is not a grey area,” he said.

“It gets tested every week, it is legal and they’ve got loads of different tests for the rear wings now, so I honestly did not know it did that until three days ago. 

“Obviously in the sport you find every bit of performance that you can without breaking the rules, and that is what we are doing and what you need to do to become a championship-winning car and team.”