That said, what a disaster of an ending for Oscar Piastri at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. The McLaren racer has been stripped of his P7 finish at the Mexico City Grand Prix after being handed a 10-second time penalty, tumbling all the way down to P15 in the final classification and walking away with zero points.
Here is the thing: the race had started looking quite promising. Following a surprise Q2 exit that left him stranded in the P12 grid slot, the Aussie fought his way into the top ten early on and steadily progressed to seventh through the pit stop cycle.
On the approach to turn 1 the driver of Car 81 attempted an overtake on the outside of Car 41. Car 81 was never fully alongside Car 41 so was not able to claim the right to the corner,
Unfortunately, things unraveled when Racing Bulls driver Arvid Lindblad managed to find a way past on a Safety Car restart, pushing Piastri back to P8. Desperate to reverse the move, Piastri tried an outside overtake around Turn 1. He held on until his front tyre made contact with Lindblad's left rear, which sent the Racing Bulls machine skidding straight into the barriers.
The stewards looked at positioning data, video, and in-car footage, ultimately deciding that the collision was entirely avoidable. "On the approach to turn 1 the driver of Car 81 attempted an overtake on the outside of Car 41. Car 81 was never fully alongside Car 41 so was not able to claim the right to the corner," the official decision document noted, adding that Piastri could have avoided the contact by moving further to the left after Turn 1.
With Piastri penalized and dropped to P15, Audi's Gabriel Bortoleto gets promoted into the points. For Piastri, this frustrating penalty marks his fourth non-scoring round of the season, joining Australia, Hungary, and Azerbaijan on the tough-luck list.
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