Piastri: The team gave me a great car once again

Piastri is increasingly looking like McLaren's winning horse, whom they should back in a bid to deny Max Verstappen a fifth consecutive Formula 1 drivers' title.

After taking his fifth win this season on Sunday in Barcelona, Piastri said: "I'm really happy to have won today. It was a great weekend overall.

"The pace was really good. We could turn it on when we needed to. It's been a great year so far and this weekend's been exactly the kind of weekend I was looking for.

"We executed everything we needed to when it counted and that's all you can ask for. The team gave me a great car once again, and I'm very proud of the work we've done.

"There was a lot of support in the grandstands, so thanks to the crowd for being out there. We couldn't have ended the triple header any better as a team," he concluded.

Piastri led teammate Lando Norris home, and McLaren scored a second one-two finish in a row after doing the same in Monaco in what was a dominant showing for the Woking squad on a weekend when the FIA changed the regulations, clamping down on flexible front wings, which was presumably targeting the dominance of the Papaya cars.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella was satisfied with how his team's Barcelona weekend panned out, and said: "We end this European triple-header with a strong performance in Barcelona and further confirmation of the MCL39's competitiveness.

"Throughout the weekend both drivers and the team were able to extract a very high level of performance from the car, which enabled us to secure this one-two today, our third of the season. The team executed the strategy and the pit stops well, making what could have been quite a tense race very smooth.

"We now head back to Woking to regroup and prepare before heading to Canada in two weeks' time," Stella concluded.

McLaren now lead the F1 constructors' championship by a whopping 197 points from Mercedes. Piastri remains on top of the drivers' standings, ten points clear of Norris in second and 49 ahead of third-placed Verstappen.