Max Verstappen overcame a series of troubles throughout the weekend to score with a stellar final lap to secure pole position in front of his home crowd. The Dutch driver put in a stellar lap at the end of qualifying to beat out the Ferrari drivers of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz by just 0.021 seconds.
But the Red Bull team didn’t show that speed all weekend. Coming off a dominating performance at Spa, Verstappen suffered a gearbox failure in first practice, and was only able to take third on the charts in final practice. Verstappen was impressed with his team for turning things around.
“Unbelievable,” exclaimed Verstappen, “especially after yesterday! We had a difficult day, but we worked really well overnight. The whole team turned it around and today we had a quick race car again, but it was very close and the pole lap was insane.”
“And today we had a quick race car again, but it was very close,” he added. “We changed things a lot… today the car was enjoyable to drive.”
Charles Leclerc beat Verstappen’s original time in the final round of qualifying, but it wasn’t good enough for Max’s second lap. He led his teammate Carlos Sainz, who will start in third on Sunday.
“It was very, very close,” Leclerc said. “Max did a great lap in the end. Our car was getting better and better through qualifying.”
At the beginning, I was pretty scared because Max was much quicker than us on used tires,” he added. “But in the end, I managed to get it together for the final session.”
Lewis Hamilton recorded the fourth-fastest time, but neither he nor sixth-fastest George Russell were able to improve upon their first lap after Sergio Perez, the other Red Bull driver, spun to bring out the yellow flags. Perez maintained his fifth position.
“Obviously the yellow flag was a bit unfortunate but that’s motor racing,” said Hamilton. “I genuinely feel good. I’m really happy the car’s finally felt alive this weekend.”
Lando Norris will start on the fourth row alongside the Haas of Mick Schumacher, with Lando’s McLaren teammate Daniel Ricciardo mired back in seventeenth. Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll complete the top ten on the grid, with Stroll unable to set a time in the third round of qualifying due to mechanical problems.
| POS | DRIVER | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1:11.317 | 1:10.927 | 1:10.342 | |
| 2 | 1:11.443 | 1:10.988 | 1:10.363 | |
| 3 | 1:11.767 | 1:10.814 | 1:10.434 | |
| 4 | 1:11.331 | 1:11.075 | 1:10.648 | |
| 5 | 1:11.641 | 1:11.314 | 1:11.077 | |
| 6 | 1:11.561 | 1:10.824 | 1:11.147 | |
| 7 | 1:11.556 | 1:11.116 | 1:11.174 | |
| 8 | 1:11.741 | 1:11.420 | 1:11.442 | |
| 9 | 1:11.427 | 1:11.428 | 1:12.556 | |
| 10 | 1:11.568 | 1:11.416 | ||
| 11 | 1:11.705 | 1:11.512 | ||
| 12 | 1:11.748 | 1:11.605 | ||
| 13 | 1:11.667 | 1:11.613 | ||
| 14 | 1:11.826 | 1:11.704 | ||
| 15 | 1:11.695 | 1:11.802 | ||
| 16 | 1:11.961 | |||
| 17 | 1:12.081 | |||
| 18 | 1:12.319 | |||
| 19 | 1:12.391 | |||
| 20 | 1:13.353 |
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