The Australian endured a horror start to the new season, and new era of technical regulations, failing to take the start of the first two grands prix.
In Australia he crashed on the lap to the grid courtesy of an unexpected power deployment, before an electrical issue with his power unit left him stranded on the grid in China.
In Japan, however, there was a significant glimmer of hope, Piastri qualifying third before surging into an early lead in the race itself.
He wound up finishing second, his cause not helped by a poorly-timed safety car, although whether he could have held off the rapid Mercedes of Kimi Antonelli was questionable at best.
Mercedes has enjoyed a dominant start to the current campaign with a win for George Russell and two for Antonelli.
Not only has the Mercedes power unit been the class of the field, the works outfit has appeared to hold a better understanding of how to manage energy with the complicated power units, giving it a clear advantage over its customer teams, McLaren, Williams and Alpine.
Some of that advantage could feasibly be tempered by changes to the technical regulations heading into the Miami GP that will limit harvesting in qualifying and reduce superclipping in both qualifying and race conditions.
However, asked in the lead-up to Miami if that could help McLaren take the fight to Mercedes across the next few races, Piastri remained pessimistic, outlining how the works team also has a chassis and aero advantage.
“I would love to say yes, but I don’t really think so,” he said.
“Mercedes, yes, I think they had a better understanding of the power unit and how to get the most out of it.
“I think in Japan, certainly on my side – obviously it was a pretty compromised weekend on Lando [Norris’] side – but on my side of the garage, I thought we did a really good job of maximising everything from the power unit and the car that we had.
“But we’re clearly still a fair way behind on just downforce and performance from the chassis as well.
“So I’m sure that gap in the power unit understanding will close a little bit, but our biggest deficit in Japan was not that we were lacking time from the power unit or how we exploit it.
“It was that our car wasn’t as good as theirs. I think that’s the bigger piece of the puzzle.”
Piastri heads to Miami sitting sixth in the standings, just four points behind teammate Norris but a whopping 51 short of early leader Antonelli.
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