Max Verstappen edged Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc to pole position at the Austrian Grand Prix after the Dutchman’s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez failed to make it past Q2.
In a fraught qualifying hour defined as much by who could keep their car within the white lines of the track boundary as by who could go fastest around the circuit, Verstappen emerged supreme, topping every segment of qualifying on his way to pole.
Leclerc ran him close at the end, getting to within 0.048s after a gutsy attack on the track’s final sector, but Verstappen’s time of 1m04.391s couldn’t be beaten. The world champ will line up in pole position on Sunday afternoon following the standalone sprint on Saturday.
“It was very difficult because of all the track limits,” he said of his fourth straight pole. “Honestly it was about surviving. Even in Q3, the first lap you just want a banker lap, which I think takes out the joy a little bit.
“At least the car is quick, and that’s the most important.”
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But it was far from smooth sailing for that quick car in the hands of Perez, who eliminated himself in Q2 after having three laps deleted for exceeding track limits at the final corner. Perez was warned several times by his team to log just a banker lap to ensure he had a time on the board, but the Mexican wasn’t able to string a legal lap together and ended up 15th.
It’s the fifth time in nine grands prix Perez hasn’t qualified in the top 10. He’ll line up 15th on Sunday’s grid.
Perez has his lap time deleted again 👀
The Mexican driver is out in Q2 ❌#AustrianGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/uYpLmE4Rq2
— Formula 1 (@F1) June 30, 2023
Leclerc and Sainz were happy to capitalize, though the Monegasque was surprised to be so close to the leader.
“Overall I don’t think we expected to be so close tot the Red Bulls, so it’s a good step forward,” he said. “The feeling has been a bit better in the last three races.”
Sainz was just 0.142s slower than Leclerc and said he felt the team had taken a step forward.
“It definitely feels like we’ve made some progress recently,” he said. “We need to be quite happy.”
Lando Norris was an excellent fourth in his heavily upgraded McLaren, lapping just 0.267s off Verstappen’s pace and 0.161s ahead of Lewis Hamilton in fifth.
Lance Stroll outqualified teammate Fernando Alonso for only the second time this season to line up sixth ahead of the Spaniard in seventh.
Nico Hulkenberg was eighth for Haas ahead of Alpine’s Pierre Gasly and Thai driver Alex Albon.
George Russell will line up a disappointing 11th, though things would’ve been much worse had Esteban Ocon, Oscar Piastri and Perez not had their fastest laps deleted at the end of the session, bumping the Briton up three places.
Ocon will line up 12th ahead of Piastri, both of whom were rivals for eighth before having their best times erased.
Valtteri Bottas overcame a difficult start to the session to qualify 14th. The Finn had caused a red flag during Q1 when he spun his car across the track at the first turn, but he eventually managed to restart his machine to qualify just ahead of the lackluster Perez in 15th.
Yuki Tsunoda will start 16th ahead of Zhou Guanyu and American rookie Logan Sargeant.
Kevin Magnussen was eliminated in 19th with an apparent gearbox problem, the Dane complaining of downshift issues in his Haas car. Under-pressure rookie Nyck de Vries qualified last for AlphaTauri.
