Oscar Piastri is to take a new McLaren chassis for the Formula 1's Azerbaijan Grand Prix as the result of his qualifying crash, The Race has learned, but has avoided a pitlane start.
The world championship leader made a mistake during a chaotic Q3 segment of qualifying, braking too late for Turn 3 and running straight on into the barriers.
The impact ripped off the front right corner of his MCL39 and his failure to set a time left him down in ninth on the grid.
Inspection by McLaren of Piastri's car on Saturday night showed that the chassis had been damaged beyond repair, and the team has taken the decision to switch him to a spare.
Normally such major preparation work risks the need to break F1's parc ferme rules – which would then open the door for a pitlane start.
However, McLaren has been able to do it within the restrictions laid down in F1's sporting regulations.
This allows for a spare car to be used if a driver has "suffered genuine accident damage or has suffered a significant failure or fault" with their original.
McLaren has to comply with other demands that: "All components of the replacement car must be the same in design and similar in mass, inertia, and function to the original car. The set-up of the suspension must be the same."
Piastri's crash in qualifying comes on a weekend where he has appeared to be not as comfortable as at other tracks.
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella thinks that some missed practice time, allied to a circuit where mistakes are punished, culminated in a tricky time.
"First of all we had a problem on the car in FP1 with Oscar, and then he was building up in FP2," said Stella.
"It's also a very unforgiving circuit, so if you are not 100% comfortable, you'd rather take it from the conservative side when it comes to finding your braking points and braking shape."
However, Stella felt Piastri had shown some promising signs of speed before his Q3 exit.
"I think Oscar's performance in qualifying was very strong, actually," he added.
"The first couple of corners before his crash, they were quite a bit faster than pole position, he was on a good pace, but he must have over-judged the grip available in the braking point in corner three.
"We have seen almost as a characteristic of Oscar that he builds through the weekend. So I think this one was one of those."
Piastri is not the only driver taking a new chassis for the race. Alpine's Franco Colapinto will also switch to a spare car, as well as a replacement gearbox, following his Q1 crash. He starts 16th.
But Charles Leclerc does not need to switch chassis despite his own qualifying crash, as Ferrari has been able to repair his car.
