Piastri expects convergence on ‘very random’ F1 2026 starts

Having raised early safety concerns on race starts in F1 2026, Oscar Piastri is seeing “very random” launches under the new procedure, as drivers get to grips with the new F1 cars.

But, once the learning process is complete – which Piastri thinks will occur after a few races – he believes that the drivers will “converge” to a similar level.

Oscar Piastri: F1 2026 starts ‘trickier from every angle’

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Piastri, alongside his McLaren team principal Andrea Stella, had raised safety concerns over race starts. The new generation F1 cars require longer to get the turbo ready for a launch.

The response from Formula 1’s governing body, the FIA, was to trial a new race start procedure at the end of each day in Bahrain testing.

Blue flashing lights inform the drivers that the race start procedure is about to begin, so the car can be prepared.

The solution appears to have been well-received from a safety point of view, while in performance terms, Ferrari has continued to catch the eye off the line.

Hamilton went from fifth to first in the Day 2 practice start, while Esteban Ocon in the Ferrari-powered Haas also got an impressive launch.

“I mean, I thought mine yesterday wasn’t too bad. I was last, but I think I passed about four cars as well,” Piastri pointed out to PlanetF1.com and others, when asked about Hamilton’s impressive practice start.

Talk that race starts could be a strong point for Ferrari in 2026 was sparked by Mercedes’ George Russell. Little has seemingly changed on that front despite the race start procedure tweak.

Russell had spoken about taking Turn 1 in first gear in his Mercedes, while Ferrari, it appeared, could run higher gears, which he tipped to help Ferrari at race starts.

Piastri puts the difference in practice start fortunes down to the learning required of a more complicated launch process.

But, he expects the drivers will get to grips with the challenge soon enough.

“So I think it’s just very random at the moment, and I think we’re all kind of learning what makes a good start, what makes a bad start,” said Piastri.

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“There’s some pretty big pitfalls you can find if you get yourself in trouble. But even just, you know, managing the power and the procedure is kind of one thing, but also just the way we do starts is much more difficult than last year. You’ve got a lot of power. The MGU-K kicks in at a certain point. So it’s trickier from every single angle.

“And I think what we’re seeing at the moment is people just getting things right and other people getting them very wrong.

“So I think certainly in the first few races, we could see some starts that look a bit like what we have this week. But I think we’ll start to converge, hopefully pretty quickly, if you’re on the bad side of that.”

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

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