Nightmare footage of moment that sparked excruciatingly ‘unlucky’ McLaren disaster

If you don’t laugh you’ll cry.

As McLaren reels from a nightmare start to the F1 season, footage has emerged of the incident that ruined both their drivers’ races at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in one fell swoop.

Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris finished 15th and 17th, respectively, in Jeddah, but it could have been a lot better especially for Piastri, who started eighth on the grid.

But on the opening lap, the Australian rookie brushed into Pierre Gasly’s Alpine, causing part of his front wing to go flying behind him on the track.

In excruciating on-board footage shared by F1’s official social media channels, that piece of debris can be seen flying straight into the front of Norris’ car, damaging his McLaren.

“I hit a lot of debris,” Norris said over team radio.

The extremely unlucky coincidence meant both Piastri and Norris were forced to have pit stops by lap 3 to replace their front wings.

It relegated the McLaren duo to the back of the grid, cruelling any hope of a top 10 finish.

“I don’t think it was anyone’s fault,” Piastri said post race.

“You know, just tight Turn 2 here and the contact was really small. I barely even felt it and I was quite surprised to have damage after it. But anyway, it happens.”

The revelation that an accidental bump by Piastri ruined his own race and that of his teammate, is further proof the first two races of the season couldn’t have gone any worse for McLaren.

Engine failure meant Piastri couldn’t finish his debut in Bahrain, but he showed promising signs in Saudi Arabia, overtaking Norris in the closing stages at the request of team orders.

Although Norris insisted he could have “easily” kept Piastri at bay if he wanted to.

“I quite easily could have probably kept the position at the end and got past the Williams but I just let him go in the end,” Norris said.

“It would be different if I was fighting for points but 16th and 17th, it doesn’t matter to me.”

McLaren is tied with AlphaTauri for dead last in the constructors’ standings on zero points and their season is already being written off as a disaster.

Norris has finished 17th in both races, prompting speculation the highly touted Brit could be eyeing a move to Mercedes when Lewis Hamilton retires.

The future looked bright for the papaya team when they finished third in the constructors’ championship in 2020, but the former giant of F1 is at a crossroads after slipping down the standings in recent seasons.

It’s also made Daniel Ricciardo’s departure from McLaren for a whopping $24 million payout look like the best sacking in history.

Now McLaren has moved to downplay hopes planned upgrades to its car at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix will bring about significant improvement on track.

“When it comes to the Baku upgrade, we do see the numbers, which are promising,” team principal Andrea Stella said, per Motorsport.com.

“It’s hopefully from sixth, it will allow us to be fifth.

“It’s not enough yet to achieve our objective for the season, which is to become a top-four car.

“This will require the Baku upgrade and we require another couple of upgrades following Baku on which we are working.”

The F1 season continues at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne on Sunday April 2.