The McLaren driver set the fastest time of Friday’s running at Albert Park with a 1m19.729s lap, edging Mercedes pair Kimi Antonelli and George Russell after earlier power issues disrupted his first outing of the day.
Piastri had reported having “no power” during FP1 and was unable to put together a clean representative lap, but the Australian said the second session allowed him to begin properly understanding Formula 1’s new-generation cars.
“I think FP2, certainly on my side, went a lot smoother than FP1,” he said.
“There are just so many things to get to grips with.
“It’s very different to what we had last year, but I think FP2 as a session was pretty smooth.”
“I was able to build some consistency and start learning properly which was good.
“We’ll try and see what we’ve learned today – I think everyone’s going to find a big step overnight so I think we need to try and do the same.”
Despite ending the day quickest in front of his home crowd, Piastri was cautious about predicting where McLaren will sit once qualifying arrives on Saturday.
Although his benchmark lap was enough to keep Antonelli and Russell behind him, the Australian suggested the pecking order could still shift significantly overnight as teams continue to learn the behaviour of the new regulations.
“The front few rows hopefully – whether it’s pole or not, I don’t know,” he said.
“I’ve not seen what our race pace or long run pace look like. I’m not sure it was as good as some others around us but I think we looked okay.”
“I think the biggest thing at the moment is just trying to build consistency, make things operate the way they should, and in FP2 it felt like we were able to get closer to doing that.”
McLaren chief designer Rob Marshall echoed Piastri’s assessment of the team’s progress, admitting the squad did not immediately find its rhythm at Albert Park.
“We didn’t hit the ground running,” Marshall said.
“It still looks pretty competitive out there – there are a lot of quick cars so I wouldn’t draw any conclusions just yet.
“There’s a long way to go this weekend.”
“Getting these cars dialled in is difficult, and getting the energy management right is very tricky.
“I think everyone’s got a bit more work to do tonight on that topic in particular.”
Third practice begins at 12.30pm AEDT on Saturday.
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