FORMULA ONE: Max Verstappen scored his fourth successive pole for the season after beating Charles Leclerc to top spot in yesterday’s (June 30) qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix.
Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen leaves the pits during the qualifying session at the Red Bull race track in Spielberg, Austria, yesterday (June 30). Photo: AFP
Verstappen topped all three segments of qualifying on the way to pole, though he was run close by Leclerc at the fall of the flag.
The Ferrari driver put it all on the line in the final sector to try to overhaul the gap, but Verstappen’s final lap of 1 minute 4.391 seconds was enough to seal the deal by just 0.048 seconds.
The Dutchman will start tomorrow’s Austrian Grand Prix from pole for the third straight season following today’s 30-minute sprint race.
But Red Bull Racing was left partly frustrated at the end of the session after Sergio Pérez knocked himself out in 15th after having three lap times deleted for exceeding track limits in Q2.
It’s the fourth successive weekend Pérez has failed to make it into the top 10 on the grid and the fifth such failure of the season.
The Mexican had had times deleted in Q1 and had been warned several times to be attentive to the white lines at the final corner, but in Q2 he neglected the warnings and paid the price.
Ferrari teammates Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz filled the breach, Sainz 0.190s off the pace. Both admitted they were surprised by how close they were able to get to Verstappen, though both appeared to take more risk on their flying laps than the leading Dutchman.
Lando Norris qualified fourth in a heavily upgraded McLaren. The British team has changed development tack after its wayward start to the campaign, and Norris’s on-track review of the new parts has been glowing, getting to within 0.267 seconds of top spot.
Lewis Hamilton was fifth for Mercedes ahead of Aston Martin teammates Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso, the Canadian outqualifying the Spaniard for just the second time this season.
Nico Hülkenberg will start eighth ahead of Pierre Gasly and Thai driver Alex Albon, who was superb to haul his Williams car into the top 10.
George Russell struggled to 11th in the second Mercedes to line up ahead of Esteban Ocon and Oscar Piastri, both of whom had Q3-worthy times deleted late in Q2 for exceeding track limits.
Valtteri Bottas recovered from a spin in Q1 that left him stuck in fourth gear – the incident caused a brief red flag while he rebooted his gearbox – to qualify 14th for Alfa Romeo ahead of Pérez.
Yuki Tsunoda qualified 16th for AlphaTauri ahead of Zhou Guanyu and Logan Sargeant.
Haas driver Kevin Magnussen said he had gearbox troubles on his way to 19th, while under-fire rookie Nyck de Vries propped up the order in 20th.
