“I don’t know what's wrong with this guy”: Franco Colapinto’s harsh assessment of McLaren’s Oscar Piastri at Abu Dhabi
Franco Colapinto was unimpressed with Oscar Piastri's maneuver, resulting in a crash between the two at the 2024 F1 Abu Dhabi GP. The Argentine later had to retire from his last race as an interim Williams driver due to power unit issues.
The Abu Dhabi GP start was quite a chaotic one for Piastri since he collided with a charging Max Verstappen, who wanted to overtake the Aussie on turn one itself. Since Piastri was not expecting Verstappen's lunge down the inside, both drivers' cars collided and they spun around. While the four-time world champion kept his balance and continued, the McLaren driver took some time to get back on track.
Soon enough, a virtual safety car was deployed due to Sergio Perez's crash, resulting in his DNF. During the restart, Oscar Piastri was behind Franco Colapinto's Williams while the entire midfield was bunched up close to one another. Hence, the Aussie couldn'tgauge the braking point correctly and slammed the brakes for Turn 6 a little later than others.
This resulted in him crashing into the back of Franco Colapinto. The Argentine then limped back to the pits with a puncture and also had a slow pitstop of 4.9 seconds.
After the race ended with him retiring the car due to unrelated engine issues, Colapinto talked about the collision with Piastri. He was surprised and confused as to what the McLaren driver was doing. Colapinto then took a slight jibe at Piastri, saying that he couldn't overtake Yuki Tsunoda, who was nearly two seconds slower than him.
“We had a very good Friday. Today I started and wanted to finish the race. Piastri came and crashed into me, I don’t know what’s wrong with this guy. He crashed into me at turn 6 and then crashed into more people. He spent five laps trying to pass Tsunoda, who was in an Alpha Tauri (now Racing Bulls), who was 2 seconds slower and [hence] I couldn’t pass him. It’s a shame because that’s when the race got complicated for us and we had a very good pace,” Colapinto said. (via Infobae)
Oscar Piastri's take on the crashing into Franco Colapinto at the 2024 F1 Abu Dhabi GP
While Franco Colapinto was furious and also confused with Oscar Piastri's maneuver that caused the crash, the Australian also addressed the incident after the race. Speaking to the media, he said he misjudged the braking point during the restart, which caused the collision with the Williams driver.
“The first few laps were pretty miserable. Turn 1 was what it was (regarding the collision with Verstappen) and on the restart with Franco, I have to look at it again, but I think I just misjudged where everyone was going to brake. There was a lot of movement towards the braking zone and I got it wrong,” Piastri said (via Infobae)
After a poor start to the race, Oscar Piastri managed to secure P10 and score a single point. Meanwhile, Franco Colapinto drove his last race with the Williams F1 team in 2024. Nothing has yet been confirmed about the Argentine's future and whether he will be hired by a team for next year or not.