American Marconi Wireless News - Piastri says Japan second place 'as good as a win' for McLaren

In what was his first grand prix of the season, Piastri lost out to Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli at Suzuka, with Norris finishing fifth.

Piastri crashed on the way to the grid at the season opener in Melbourne and missed the race in China due to a technical problem.

Norris also did not start in China because of a separate issue.

Piastri said it had been a "really encouraging" race in Japan after McLaren's early-season woes.

"I think the strategy was good, so I think we just nailed everything," he said.

"Unfortunately it wasn't quite enough for the win, but I think at the moment a result like today is as good as a win for us."

Piastri led from Mercedes' George Russell for the first half of the race but Antonelli took advantage of a safety car to jump into the lead.

Piastri had already pitted by the time the safety car came out midway through the race.

The Australian said he "would have loved to have seen how it would have panned out" if he had been able to continue his battle with the Mercedes from a leading position.

But he said overall the Japanese Grand Prix had been "probably one of my best weekends in F1".

"As race weekends go, we couldn't have done any better than that," he said.

"I'm very happy with the performance that I put in, very happy with the performance from the whole team."

Norris went into the race with little driving time under his belt, having been unable to take part in the first half of all three practice sessions.

He managed to pick off Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton for fifth place late in the race and he said it had been "a strong day for the team".

"Second and fifth is a good result and a sign of the hard work the team is putting in, so thanks to them," said Norris.

"It's a sign we're heading in the right direction."

L.Harper--AMWN