Piastri bolts to sprint race pole from Russell and Norris

Oscar Piastri ended a difficult run of Formula 1 form with pole for the Qatar Grand Prix sprint race, besting a late effort from George Russell as Lando Norris finished third.

Piastri had shown much improved pace from the outset of the Qatar weekend and headlined the sole free practice session, and set the best time among the first set of soft-tyre runs in SQ3 – just 0.044s ahead of team-mate Norris.

The McLaren pair then faced pressure as Russell opened his second lap in swaggering style; the Briton found almost two tenths on Piastri to sit at the top of the timing boards for a brief moment.

However, Piastri was improving on his second effort and found 0.032s over Russell to secure pole for Saturday’s 19-lap sprint race, although Norris’ second attempt did not yield that improvement.

Norris was down on his best lap in the opening two sectors, and dipped a wheel into gravel on the exit of the final corner to compound a difficult tour. Regardless, his first time was good enough for third on the sprint grid, with Fernando Alonso due to start alongside him on the second row as the Aston Martin driver unlocked good pace.

Yuki Tsunoda outqualified Max Verstappen, as the Dutchman struggled to cope with the level of bouncing present in his car on the soft tyre. Verstappen’s opening lap was aborted and, while he managed to register a clean run at the end, it was beaten by Tsunoda by just 0.009s.

Verstappen had been investigated alongside Norris as both were investigated for impeding each other at various phases of SQ1 – but no further action was taken.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli bundled into seventh despite almost falling out of qualifying in the second phase of the session, 0.01s ahead of Carlos Sainz. Charles Leclerc finished the session ninth ahead of Alex Albon, who ensured that both Williams cars had got into SQ3 despite the team’s expectations to struggle with the range of corners present at the Qatar circuit.

Antonelli had earned a reprieve and an entry into the final part of sprint qualifying when Isack Hadjar had his lap deleted for track limits at Turn 8; the Mercedes driver had not initially done enough on his final lap to progress, but Hadjar lost his 10th-place time after going off.

Ollie Bearman improved on his final lap but was unable to progress beyond 12th, while Gabriel Bortoleto outqualified team-mate Nico Hulkenberg; the Saubers will line up in 13th and 14th. Esteban Ocon was also eliminated from SQ2 in 15th.

Lewis Hamilton was the biggest scalp claimed in the opening stage of sprint qualifying as he was unable to improve enough in his final lap to progress to SQ2. Hamilton sat in the drop zone ahead of his last effort, and only progressed up to 15th place – with drivers lower down the order improving on their final runs.

Antonelli’s subsequent lap put Hamilton back into the bottom five, and improvements from Hadjar, Bearman, and Ocon ensured that Hamilton was pushed further down the order. The late improvement of the Haas drivers and Albon put Lance Stroll and Liam Lawson into the bottom five, ahead of Hamilton.

The Alpine duo of Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto propped up the order having scarcely factored outside of the drop zone throughout the session.

F1 Qatar GP – Sprint qualifying results

We want to hear from you!

– The Autosport.com Team