The lap times dropped and dropped over today’s qualifying session as the circuit’s new surface rubbered in with significant soft tyre running. Piastri ran twice in Q3, with his second run being 0.082s quicker than the final lap posted by George Russell, who will start P2. This time also means the Shanghai lap record has been reset twice this weekend – first by Hamilton’s Sprint Pole lap and now again by Piastri’s Pole time – with Piastri’s lap 0.208s quicker.

Yesterday’s Sprint qualifying running provided a dress rehearsal for the teams to perfect their efforts today, and this opportunity was used to McLaren’s advantage as they learned from their run plan errors. Piastri had been vocal about his feelings towards the team’s choice to fuel the cars for two push laps back to back in SQ3, which left their tyres two laps older than the Ferraris’ or Verstappen’s as the track conditions optimised.

In contrast, today Piastri ran two push laps in Q3 separated by a pit stop and presumably a refuel – a strategy that meant even his first push lap was good enough for Pole, albeit with a much smaller margin to Russell in P2.

He said McLaren “executed it the way we should have” which allowed him to extract the inherent pace of the car, which Oscar felt hadn’t shifted much versus Sprint qualifying.

Reflecting on his laps, Piastri posited that his first lap was “honestly better than his second”, and perhaps with this in mind he was able to approach the final run with higher risk than others in the field who needed a more significant improvement for a chance at Pole.

“Just at the hairpin at the end of the straight I lost a bit of time and didn’t do the best hairpin,” he said of his first run.

“And then the second lap I was about two-tenths down on myself, so I kind of just went, why not send it into the hairpin, and I gained those two-tenths back and then found a little bit more in the last corner.”

It was this that meant Piastri said he’d done the “hairpin of [his] life” over the radio as he concluded his lap and was met with the news he’d secured Pole.

The telemetry behind the hairpin of Piastri’s life

And the telemetry and delta comparing his two Q3 laps demonstrates the difference this approach to the final few corners made.

To that point, as Piastri said, he was two tenths down on his previous lap, despite having made some inroads to the time through turns two and three. By braking marginally later into turn 14, coming off the brake later, and not feathering the throttle as much out of the corner too, he pulls back a tenth on his first lap.

Piastri then carries around 2-3km/h more through turn 15 and down the run to the final corner, also approaching turn 16 with a top speed 18km/h higher than his first lap. He breaks even with his first lap time on the entry to this corner as a result, before braking later, and getting back on the throttle earlier again to be a peak of 0.065s up at the exit of turn 16.

By the line, this is cut to 0.062s, and it’s an improvement good enough to see his time as the first to enter the 1:30.6s this weekend.

Lining up alongside Piastri on the grid will be George Russell, with Lando Norris and Max Verstappen on the second row. The Sprint offered a preview to the drivers and teams as to what they may contend with in the Grand Prix, namely significant degradation especially in dirty air. Piastri’s aim therefore is to put that learning to use and target holding onto the clean air out front as long as possible.