Verstappen beats Russell to pole, Norris third

Max Verstappen took his first Formula 1 pole since June after headlining Qatar Grand Prix qualifying, after knocking George Russell off the top of the order by 0.055s.

After a series of struggles across the sprint sessions, Red Bull unearthed extra pace to compete for the fastest time in qualifying, and Verstappen praised the turnaround in fortunes over the radio after clinching pole.

Russell had set the pace on the opening tours of Q3 with a 1m20.575s, but his own efforts to improve on his second lap of the final session ended after losing time in the second and third sectors. This opened the gate for Verstappen, who scorched to a 1m20.520s to chip 0.055s out of Russell’s benchmark.

Verstappen nonetheless has an investigation pending with the stewards having been pinged for apparently surpassing the maximum allowed laptime on one of his sighter laps.

Sprint winner Lando Norris took third on the grid as McLaren seemed to drop back in qualifying versus its Friday one-lap pace, and starts Sunday’s race alongside Oscar Piastri on the second row of the grid.

Charles Leclerc bagged fifth on the grid ahead of Lewis Hamilton, as the Mercedes driver split the two Ferraris on Sunday’s grid, while Fernando Alonso booked himself into eighth.

Although Kevin Magnussen seemed on for ninth on the grid with his early opening timed lap to the session, he was nudged down to 10th by Sergio Perez by just 0.075s.

Pierre Gasly was edged out of a Q3 appearance at the final blow of the whistle as he was on the receiving end of a flurry of late improvements for Hamilton and Alonso.

Alonso, who was yet to set a lap in Q2 after aborting his earlier effort, fired his way up to a provisional seventh in the order with his final tour. This put Hamilton into the bottom five, but the seven-time world champion swiftly responded with a lap good enough for fifth.

This left Gasly out of luck, having been just 0.012s shy of Perez on the other side of the cut-off line. He was nonetheless clear of Zhou Guanyu, who appeared energised by Sauber’s upgrades and clinched 12th on the grid – two tenths clear of team-mate Valtteri Bottas.

Yuki Tsunoda was 14th as RB was still apparently short on pace in Qatar, as Lance Stroll was also eliminated in the intermediate qualifying stage.

Alex Albon was dropped into the bottom five at the climax of Q1 by Tsunoda, who crept above the cut-off line despite having not set a personal best sector in any of the three splits around the Losail circuit.

Unlike Tsunoda, Liam Lawson could not escape the drop zone on his final tour, but outqualified sprint-race points-scorer Nico Hulkenberg. The German received an apology over the radio from race engineer Gary Gannon, who noted that the team hadn’t “got the softs right”.

Franco Colapinto and Esteban Ocon also earned early exits from qualifying after propping up the order in Q1.

Qatar Grand Prix – qualifying result